India to hold talks with Australia on nuclear fuel,coal & gas imports

India will hold bilateral talks with Australia during the next two days for purchase of nuclear fuel besides increasing its import of coal and gas even as Canberra has announced a controversial plan to impose windfall tax (super profit tax) on domestic coal producers.Australia exports coal worth $6 billion a year to the Indian companies, including Tata Steel, the Essar Group and Gujarat NRE.

In addition, Australia also exports iron ore and gold worth a total of another $6 billion. Exports of coal from Australia are expected to further increase with the interest by public sector majors such as Coal India and NTPC Ltd to purchase coal mines to fuel the industry requirements back home.

The Union Power Minister, Mr Sushil Kumar Shinde, told newspersons on Sunday that he will hold bilateral talks with his Australian counterpart on import of coal, gas and nuclear fuel during his visit to the Pacific Rim country.“We will hold bilateral meeting on energy conservation here,” he said. 

The Indian delegation also consists of the Power Secretary, Mr P. Uma Shankar, the Chairman and Managing Director of NTPC, Mr R.S. Sharma, and the Chairman and Managing Director of Power Grid Corporation, Mr S.K. Chaturvedi. Representatives from the industry association, FICCI, Petronet LNG Ltd, GAIL India Ltd besides Bajaj Hindustan and Visa Resources are part of the delegation.

Uranium sourcing

There are also plans to initiate some discussions on sourcing uranium from Australia, though at present the Labour Government here has already made it clear it will not supply uranium to those countries which have not signed the NPT (non-proliferation treaty).But India has maintained that uranium is important for the country to secure “clean'' energy for its population. It expects Australia to recognise the fact that India has a good record on its usage of uranium which will help the country to cut greenhouse gases.

Mr Shinde said India will seek additional LNG supplies for its fuel-starved projects in India from Australia as well. It plans to source coal from the international subsidiary of NTPC. Mr Shinde also said that NTPC is also looking at buying stake in some of the coal mines across Australia.He pointed out that several private sector companies in India are also looking to buy coal mines in Australia.