Seven companies have qualified to bid for the 2026-2027 term tender to supply 2.28 million metric tonnes of coal for the Lakvijaya power plant, the Sunday Times reported. Nine bidders submitted offers; two — Avra International FZCO (UAE) and HMS Bergbau (Germany) — were deemed non-responsive.
The contenders still in the running are Mohit Minerals Ltd, Taranjot Resources (Pvt) Ltd, Visa Resources (Pte) Ltd, Potencia LLC-FZ, Aditya Birla Global Trading (Singapore) Pte Ltd, A2A Trading FZE and GMR Metallurgical Resources AG (Switzerland). Bids closed on Thursday.
Lanka Coal Company (LCC) opened the latest tender to all eligible coal suppliers, dropping the earlier requirement that bidders be pre-registered with LCC, a change the company said was intended to widen participation.
Two new conditions also govern the award. The substantially responsive lowest bidder will be allocated a minimum of 50 percent of the requirement, with the option to increase that share. The second-lowest responsive bidder will be offered the chance to match the lowest price for the remaining 50 percent. “In the event of disagreement, the process shall continue with the next lowest responsible bidders for awarding the balance quantity,” the tender states. In previous procurements the full contract went to a single lowest bidder.
Qualification thresholds were also raised. Bidders must now have supplied more than 2 million metric tonnes of coal in the past 36 months, including a minimum of 1 million tonnes with a gross calorific value (GCV) of 5,900 kcal/kg or above. The earlier benchmark was 500,000 tonnes of any coal type, with just 100,000 tonnes above the 5,900 GCV mark.
The tightened framework follows the substandard-coal fiasco involving India’s Trident Chemphar in the 2025-2026 season, which triggered repeated off-specification shipments, a Presidential Coal Commission of Inquiry, and the resignation of Energy Minister Kumara Jayakody and his Secretary.
Lanka Coal opened the 2.28-million-tonne tender for the September 2026–April 2027 cycle on April 7, with deliveries planned across 38 shipments. The Lakvijaya plant at Norochcholai is the country’s primary base-load generator.
