Guest post by David Middleton
Coal prices are on the rise again. With benchmark rates in Australia up over 30 percent since July — approaching the $100/t mark that prevailed in November 2016 after a massive run-up last year.
And a number of events the past week show that things could get even more heated in coal over the coming months.
The biggest story recently has been China. Where a push to restrict coal imports has driven local prices to multi-year highs. With data this week from Platts showing that 102 coal-laden boats are currently anchored offshore of Chinese ports, unable to deliver their loads.
[…]
And China isn’t the only place where demand is going up. With South Korea also seeing record coal imports of late — bringing in an all-time high 11.3 million tonnes in September, with October imports expected to set a fresh record at 12 million tonnes.
That’s reportedly coming as new coal-fired plants start up, and Korean nuclear plants experience downtime. Meaning Korean users are scrambling for supplies — even as mine output may be about to take a hit.
[…]
That threat of lost supply — and rising global demand — is all coming just as new and significant players are entering the coal space. Such as Bangladesh: where state minerals firm Petrobangla said this week it is looking at buying stakes in coal mines in South Africa, Australia and Indonesia.
Petrobangla’s stated goal is to acquire captive supply for export back to Bangladesh’s surging coal-fired power sector. Which would mean one more mouth to feed at a time when supply and prices are getting extremely tight.
Watch for ongoing import numbers in China and Korea, and for South African strike announcements and Bangladesh deals.
By Dave Forest
What could be even better than “soaring” coal prices? The resurgence of the American coal industry and surging U.S. coal exports!
Why are U.S. coal exports surging? The end of the War on Coal is one factor… But the fact that U.S. coal prices are far less than the $100/t level.
Even better news for coal: Despite the surge in prices, coal is still highly competitive with natural gas (~$3/mmbtu) in these nominally United States…
To paraphrase the great Samuel Clemens “The reports of coal’s death are greatly exaggerated.”
With Tesla and EV’s floundering and coal surging… What on Earth can save us from Gorebal Warming? (wink-wink-nudge-nudge)
And to think Hillary and her bag man Tommy wanted to shut coal down . Pretty easy to see who will be going down now . My oh my who sold out USA uranium to Russia for cash ? Who paid to have a fake Russia dossier whipped up ? Who bought the Democrat party and forgot to tell Bernie he didn’t stand a chance ?
Coal thrives is certainly good news at least .
David, another great article with real data to understand the post.
Thanks
Hivemind
November 2, 2017 at 1:16 pm: I suspect your nom de guerre gives you away, but the griffbot is designed to be an insult to the truth. Zero sympathy is waranted. We would indeed be insulted if we had reason to take her seriously….
Meanwhile, here in the UK…..
We’ve got this massive power station – built on top of a coalmine – called Drax….
Are they running it on coal..? Nah…..
They’re trashing the forests of North Carolina…. Shredding the trees into wood pellets….. Shipping them all the way across the Atlantic….. Loading them onto trains at the port to bring them to the power station (hoping that they don’t self-combust on the way or in storage)…. and then burning them – because its more ECO-FRIENDLY…..
Not missing anything, am I..?
Drax still has 3 of 6 units working on coal – but will be changing that (as UK moves towards total coal plant shut down in 2025)
http://www.yorkpress.co.uk/news/15619209.Drax_consultation_starts_on_gas_power_and_battery_storage/
and yes, the woodchip thing is not reducing CO2 or environmentally sensible.
https://www.chathamhouse.org/expert/comment/wood-not-carbon-neutral-energy-source
The UK govt is showing signs of recognising this…
Meanwhile you could join a campaign against Drax – google ‘axedrax’
I hope Trump realises he NEEDS to stop the devastation of the USA’s forests.
Battery storage.. dangerous stuff !!! FAR more dangerous than coal power, which is actually HIGHLY BENEFICIAL in its by-products.
Sustaining ALL LIFE ON EARTH…
Yes, even yours, griff, for what its worth.. !!
Lot of money being made by buying old coal fired power stations , buy them cheap , keep them ticking over and when people wake up to the renewable scam and the fact its weather dependant and unreliable KA CHING .
What renewable scam?
You can buy contracts for solar produced electricity for $.03 kWh
“In 2016, countries from Chile to the United Arab Emirates broke records with deals to generate electricity from sunshine for less than 3 cents a kilowatt-hour, half the average global cost of coal power. ”
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-01-03/for-cheapest-power-on-earth-look-skyward-as-coal-falls-to-solar
Turn your 1GW coal power station into a battery. I think that the Germans have already done it. An al”gore”rythm turns on the power output when the price is right.
The death of coal is less than 150 years away.
From the Coal Industry’s own website:
“There are an estimated 1.1 trillion tonnes of proven coal reserves worldwide. This means that there is enough coal to last us around 150 years at current rates of production.”
https://www.worldcoal.org/coal/where-coal-found
At an annual consumption increase of 1% (from the current 7,500 Million Tonnes/yr) that 150 years drops to 90
At an annual consumption increase of 2% (from the current 7,500 Million Tonnes/yr) that 150 years drops to 70
At an annual consumption increase of 5% (from the current 7,500 Million Tonnes/yr) that 150 years drops to 40
Coal should be used as the starting point for carbon nanotubes and graphene production — not electricity/heat generation and the production of useless toxic slag
Peak coal.. just keeps getting further and further away. 🙂
The world will ALWAYS need CO2 !!
And thankfully, this CO2-HATRED madness cannot last forever.
Sooner or later REALITY will triumph.
Proven reserves represent the minimum (P90, 1P)amount of coal that can be produced from currently developed deposits. Probable coal reserves represent the most likely (P50, 2P) amount of coal that can economically be produced from currently developed deposits. Probable reserves are, by definition, much larger than proved reserves. Possible (P10, 3P) reserves represent the maximum amount of coal that could be economically produced from currently developed deposits. Possible reserves are larger than probable. Coal resources are undeveloped and/or undiscovered deposits. Resource potential is far larger than all 3P reserves.
This is just the US…
US coal resources are about 4 trillion tons.
Shrug… in the U.S. we have a 500 year supply of coal.
DavidMid: this is a disturbing post. are
you really so wrapped up in the agw/Nagw
issue that you don’t see that coal emissions
are very hazardous to people — not to say
that mining it is
even
more so
to coal miners?
coal emits aerosols
and mercury. this kills
about 10^4 people in the
US a year, and poisons
baby’s brains.
coal polluting in CHN is
reducing lifespans by up to
10 years.
it is very dismaying that y0u
would ignore all this for the
sake of an ideological
argument.
Yet another incoherent mindless rant from crackpot.
You really are HIGH on something today, aren’t you !
“coal emits aerosols
and mercury. this kills
about 10^4 people in the
US a year, and poisons
baby’s brains.”
Ah, that’s your excuse, is it?
When you were a baby your brain was poisoned by mercury emissions from coal…
Yep, that figures…