Remember when China vowed last year to hit peak carbon emissions in 2030 and to reach carbon neutrality in 2060? Maybe it will (spoiler alert: it won’t)… … but long before we hit 2060, China plans on taking coal-based pollution to the next level. Overnight coal futures prices a hit record level and are almost +80% higher than a year ago, signalling a desperate need for China to increase domestic production in the short term, notwithstanding the government’s plan to reduce reliance on coal in the long term. As Reuters energy analyst John Kemp writes, “electricity consumption is surging and the country is struggling to import sufficient volumes of competitively priced spot LNG, boosting the need for coal for power generation.” Prices for the most-traded thermal coal futures contract on the Zhengzhou Commodity Exchange hit $150 a tonne on Tuesday, up from $85 a year ago, which was also […]