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Can China’s Shale Gas Help It Reach Peak Coal by 2020?

Can China’s Shale Gas Help It Reach Peak Coal by 2020? thumbnail China’s GDP has grown 670% from $1.2 trillion at the beginning of the century to $9.24 trillion in 2013. That’s mind-numbingly fast growth. Perhaps the only thing more amazing is how the country has accomplished the feat: with the help from coal,  a lot of coal. Some estimates demonstrate that China has had to build at least one new coal power per week to fuel growth, which is backed up by the fact that nearly 80% of all electricity generated there comes from coal (compared to just 39% in the United States). However, after recently agreeing to peak carbon dioxide emissions by 2030 or sooner, economists quickly realized that China would need to reach peak coal usage well before then. No surprise, then, that Beijing announced last month that coal use would peak by 2020. In fact, some provinces will […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Hampton Roads coal exports down 33.5% year on year in November

Houston (Platts)–4Dec2014/558 pm EST/2258 GMT Coal exports from Virginia’s Hampton Roads region totaled 2.77 million st in November, up 1.5% from the prior month but down 33.5% from the year-ago month, the Virginia Maritime Association said Thursday. While neither the association nor the individual terminals comment on monthly export data, the decline is attributed to weak overseas pricing for both metallurgical and thermal coal due to lower demand and global oversupply. For thermal pricing, Platts on Thursday assessed coal delivered to the ports of Amsterdam, Rotterdam and Antwerp (CIF ARA) at $71.95/mt (or $65.27/st), down nearly 14% from the start of the year. For US met coal, Platts assessed low volatile matter hard coking coal FOB East Coast on Thursday at $113/mt (or $102.51/st), down 13% from the start of the year. Lambert’s Point, which is owned and operated by Norfolk, Virginia-based Norfolk Southern, exported 1,371,040 st in November, […]

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Peak Coal: Why the Industry’s Dominance May Soon Be Over

The coal industry has achieved stunning growth in the last decade, largely due to increased demand in China. But big changes in China’s economy and its policies are expected to put an end to coal’s big boom. by fred pearce After a decade in which coal has been grabbing an ever-larger share of the world’s energy supply, could coal’s boom be about to turn to bust? Both the United States and China are planning to curb coal, and analysts say the repercussions for the global industry could be dramatic. The world may soon breathe a great deal easier, as the biggest contributor to both urban smog and climate change goes into decline. Earlier this month, the Obama administration announced curbs on CO2 emissions from coal-fired power plants, designed to deliver a cut in U.S. A worker shovels coal at a mine facility in Anhui province in eastern China. AFP/Getty […]

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Utilities Press Railroad to Speed Coal Deliveries

A BNSF train waits on the tracks near a Becker, Minn., power plant. Rail congestion… ENLARGE A BNSF train waits on the tracks near a Becker, Minn., power plant. Rail congestion has slowed deliveries. Minneapolis Star Tribune/Zuma Press Saying they are running short on coal, electric utilities from Minnesota to Texas are trying to pressure Warren Buffett ’s BNSF Railway Co. to speed up deliveries on its congested tracks before the worst of the winter weather hits. One group of utilities has petitioned federal regulators to impose a timetable on BNSF to add workers and improve tracks leading east from coal fields in Wyoming. Utilities also are negotiating directly with BNSF. In Minnesota, politicians and regulators warn that consumers could pay millions of dollars in extra charges if utilities have to buy high-cost backup power because they can’t operate their coal-fired power plants. BNSF, which is owned by Berkshire […]

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Natural Gas Boom Is Drowning Out Coal Industry’s Battle Cries

4729 Votes Natural Gas Boom Is Drowning Out Coal Industry’s Battle Cries While a lot of the political fodder during the 2014 election season focused on the “war on coal,” a bigger and even stronger show of force is transforming the nation’s economic landscape, especially in “war torn” Appalachia: natural gas. The natural resource has emerged from the back burner of U.S. energy development and onto the hot seat. Over the last seven years, it has not only fueled new economic growth but it has also changed the way electricity is generated. Beyond the newfound abundance — a result of shale gas drilling technologies — the manufacturing sector has subsequently boomed. To be clear, dry natural gas can be used for electric generation. Wet natural gas, or natural gas liquids that include methane, ethane butane and propane, are separated from the dry gas. Those elements are then used as […]

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Proposed US EPA rule to have significant impact on power grid: ERCOT analysis

Houston (Platts)–17Nov2014/457 pm EST/2157 GMT The Electric Reliability Council of Texas anticipates that implementation of the US Environmental Protection Agency’s proposed rule for reducing greenhouse gas emissions will result in the retirement of up half of ERCOT’s coal generation capacity, raise retail energy bills up to 20% and lead to a greater likelihood of rotating outages. ERCOT Monday released its analysis of the impact of the Clean Power Plan, saying it "is evident that implementation … will have a significant impact on the planning and operation of the ERCOT grid." "ERCOT’s primary concern with the Clean Power Plan is that, given the ERCOT region’s market design and existing transmission infrastructure, the timing and scale of the expected changes needed to reach the CO2 emission goals could have a harmful impact on reliability," according to the report. " … it is unknown, based on the information currently available, whether compliance […]

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Coal versus climate in Australia

Prime Minister Tony Abbott has described the science on climate change as ‘crap’ [Getty Images] Australia continues to frustrate efforts by fellow G20 members to include climate change on the agenda at the upcoming leaders’ summit in the eastern city of Brisbane this weekend. As the host nation sets the G20 meeting’s agenda , Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott – an avowed sceptic of human-caused climate change – has resisted calls for global warming to be discussed when world leaders gather on November 15 and 16. Despite a recent official draft summary of proceedings appearing to make token references to climate change, the level of importance afforded to the issue remains unclear. Climate change was on the agenda at the previous eight G20 summits. Since forming the government in September 2013, Abbott has repealed Australia’s nascent emissions trading scheme and slashed funding to agencies and programmes promoting renewable energy and […]

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Coal’s Defender-in-Chief Tries to Shift Debate About Fuel

By Tim Loh Nov 5, 2014 4:00 PM PT 2 Comments Email Print Greg Boyce, who leads the world’s biggest publicly traded coal company, wants people to focus on the fuel’s virtues, not its warts. His pitch: cheap and abundant coal should be used to drive economic growth and help the world’s impoverished improve their lives. “It’s pretty strange that, globally, not only the UN, but developed country leaders are spending so much time on, quote, climate change,” said Boyce, chief executive officer of Peabody Energy Corp. (BTU) “They aren’t focusing on how you eliminate poverty, eliminate energy poverty, and start driving global economic activity.” Boyce is wading into an issue at the very heart of the future of the global economy, at a time when his own company, which exports coal worldwide, hasn’t reported annual profit since 2011. The global debate is marked by dual demands: how to […]

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European 2015 Coal Falls a Second Month as Natural Gas Plunges

European coal for delivery in 2015 fell for a second month as natural gas tumbled after Russia agreed to terms for resuming gas exports to Ukraine. European next-year coal declined 1.3 percent to $71.55 a metric ton as of 4:55 p.m. in London, .extending the monthly loss to 3.3 percent, according to broker data on Bloomberg. U.K. gas for delivery next summer slid as much as 1.9 percent today and declined 6.2 percent in October, the biggest monthly drop since the contract started trading. Lower gas prices increase profits at power plants burning the fuel to generate electricity. U.K. utilities consumed the least coal in August since at least 1995, data published yesterday by the Department of Energy and Climate Change showed. “The deal could put downward pressure on the price of European coal,” Thomas Pugh, a commodities economist at Capital Economics Ltd., said in an e-mailed note. “The […]

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Coal Miners Fired in Appalachia Getting Hired in Wyoming

It’s boom times in Wyoming for embattled U.S. coal companies, where the mining industry is hiring workers while shedding them in Appalachia. Alpha Natural Resources Inc. (ANR) , the second-largest U.S. producer, hasn’t posted a profit in three years and is closing money-losing mines in West Virginia amid plans to increase production out West by as much as 30 percent. Miner Steven King is going along for the ride. After losing his job last month at the company’s Black Castle operation, King, 42, is getting ready to move his family 1,500 miles (2,400 kilometers) to a state he’s never visited to work at an Alpha site in Wyoming. With the U.S. coal industry in its worst decline in decades, companies including Alpha and Peabody Energy Corp. (BTU) , the biggest producer, are pivoting toward pockets of future profit. No prospect is bigger than the Powder River Basin, a high, […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple