India plans to phase down at least 81 coal-fired utilities over the next four years, the federal power ministry told top energy department officials of state and federal government in a letter.

The energy hungry nation expects the plan to reduce power generation by 58 billion kilowatt hours (kWh) from the 81 utilities to save 34.7 million tonnes of coal and cut carbon emissions by 60.2 million tonnes, the power ministry said.

(Reporting by Sudarshan Varadhan; Editing by Toby Chopra)