Global Coal Trends Through 2020

Over the next five years, the global coal industry is expected to witness a fundamental structural change to the seaborne market: a move away from Chinese led demand growth. The last 10 yr have seen significant growth in the global seaborne market. But with global production seeming to have peaked in 2014, serious issues remain as to its sustainability.

The majority of global coal reserves are located in the US, followed by Russia, China, Australia, India and Germany, which collectively account for 76.9% of the global total. The major producers are China, the US, India, Australia, Indonesia and Russia, collectively accounting for 81.1% of global production in 2014. Logically, this means that a country, such as Indonesia, is rather rapidly depleting its reserves. Over the forecast period, these rankings will remain the same, with little movement in position, as had happened with the rapid rise of Indonesia over the previous decade when production increased from 154 million t in 2005 to 458 million t in 2014. Other developed countries, such as Australia and the US, may never find an economic need to exploit their reserves.

For the two largest consumers of coal, China and the US, serious efforts are now being made to curtail coal use, which contributed to global consumption decreasing in 2014. Consumption in 2014 fell by 62 million t compared to 2013, and it will likely decrease again in 2015. This would be the first fall in consecutive years in recent history. Efforts to curtail consumption include increased environmental protection regulations and the US government’s plans to decrease overall coal consumption by 180.4 million t and by 2.2% in electricity generation in 2015 over 2014. The Chinese government has also initiated an ambitious campaign to diversify its energy sources, consolidate its coal mines and cap consumption, announcing various coal quality restrictions and a ban on new developments of coal-fired plants.

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