Climate Policy Engagement Analysis
Climate Policy Engagement Overview: Coal India exhibits limited policy engagement that is broadly misaligned with policy pathways for delivering the temperature goals of the Paris Agreement. It supports a long-term role for coal in India’s energy mix.
Top-line Messaging on Climate Policy: Coal India Limited (CIL) has limited top-line communications on climate change. In a February 2024 report, the company acknowledged that India is a signatory to the Paris Agreement without demonstrating clear support for the climate treaty. In a June 2023 article by Financial Express, CIL did not appear to support drastic emissions reductions, suggesting that IPCC recommended timelines are unlikely. Despite this, CIL Chairman PM Prasad broadly supported India’s greenhouse gas (GHG) target of net-zero by 2070 in a February 2024 article by the Economic Times. CIL has not explicitly supported the need for government regulation to respond to climate change.
Engagement with Climate-Related Regulations: Coal India Limited (CIL) has very limited transparent engagement with climate-related regulations. However, in a February 2024 report, CIL supported India’s commitment to create additional carbon sinks under the Paris Agreement. The company did not respond to the 2023 CDP Climate Change Information Request.
Positioning on Energy Transition: Coal India Limited (CIL) supports a long-term role for coal in India’s energy mix. For example, in June 2025 Economic Times article, Chairman PM Prasad advocated for the reopening of coal mines, citing the inability of the renewables sector to meet the growing energy demand. He further called for coal to peak by 2035, flatten by 2047, and ultimately be phased down by 2070. Relatedly, in a February 2024 report, the company supported a sustained role for coal in India up to "at least" 2040. Further, in a February 2024 Economic Times article, Chairman PM Prasad advocated for coal gasification as a means to transition towards “cleaner energy”. These positions are misaligned with IPCC science-based pathways to 1.5°C warming, which highlight the need for significant reductions in fossil fuel use, with only a limited and/or targeted role for fossil fuels with CCUS in the 2050 energy mix. In October 2024, Climate Change News reported that the company had engaged with the Indian government to weaken pollution regulations for coal plants.
Industry Association Governance: Coal India Limited (CIL) appears to have disclosed a partial list of industry association memberships in its 2024-25 Business Responsibility and Sustainability Report. It has, therefore, excluded its membership to FutureCoal (Formerly World Coal Organization), which appears oppositional to ambitious global climate change policy. Moreover, the company provides no further details regarding its role within these organizations or their climate policy positions and engagement activities. CIL has not published a review of its alignment with industry associations on climate change.
InfluenceMap collects and assesses evidence of corporate climate policy engagement on a weekly basis, depending on the availability of information from each specific data source (for more information see our methodology). While this analysis flows through to the company’s scores each week, the summary above is updated periodically. This summary was last updated in Q3 2025.
Additional Note: CIL is headquartered in India, where InfluenceMap’s LobbyMap platform can currently only make a provisional assessment of corporate climate policy engagement, due to limited capability to access publicly available data on this issue. As it is possible that InfluenceMap is not yet able to fully capture evidence of CIL's climate policy engagement activities, these scores should be considered provisional at this time.
In addition, CIL is a listed company with more than 50% of its shares owned by the government of India. State-owned enterprises likely retain channels of direct and private engagement with government officials that InfluenceMap is unable to assess, and therefore are not represented in CIL's engagement intensity metric.