Others News
- Coal prices may increase on environmental costs
Date: 17-Sep-2007 Sources: (Shenzhen Daily)
COAL prices in China, the world's largest producer and consumer of the fuel, are likely to rise as authorities strengthen regulations to improve environmental and safety standards at mines, a government official said.
'China's low coal prices are the result of a neglect of environmental and safety issues in the past,'Hou Shiguo, a deputy director in charge of industry policies at the National Development and Reform Commission, said in a telephone interview in Beijing on Saturday. 'We will step up efforts on the policy level to make our coal mines cleaner and safer, and that will accordingly increase companies' production costs.'
The Chinese Government has pledged to reduce accidents at pits that killed 4,746 people in 2006, making the country's coal mining industry the most dangerous in the world. Prices of coal rose to a record last month at Qinhuangdao, China's largest port for the fuel, because of increased use of air-conditioners. China burns coal for 78 percent of its power.
'The increase in prices is a long-term trend as the government moves toward a more market-based mechanism to price coal,'said Hou, who works for China's top economic planning agency. Higher crude oil prices are driving up operating costs and contributing to making coal more expensive, he said.
China became a net coal importer for the first time in January, ending centuries of self-sufficiency.
Japanese utilities may have to pay 22 percent more for Australian coal next year after South Korean buyers locked in supplies seven months early, anticipating a shortage, Goldman Sachs JBWere Pty. said in a Sept. 13 report.
Prices of thermal coal may jump to US$68 a ton, increasing an earlier forecast by 10 percent. South Korean utilities ordered one-quarter of their planned 2008 purchases from Australia at about US$66, before contracts start April 1, it said, citing McCloskey's Coal Report.
In China, 'Coal prices will peak next year and may fall in 2009 on expanded capacity worldwide and improved port and transportation facilities,'Huang Teng, manager of Beijing-based LT Consultants Ltd., whose clients include Japanese utilities purchasing coal from China, said by telephone in Beijing on Saturday.
The nation's coal imports surged 50 percent to 30.96 million tons in the first seven months while exports fell 21 percent to 28.86 million tons, according to customs data released Aug. 15.
China's coal producers increased output by 10 percent in the first half to 1.26 billion tons, while demand gained 12 percent to 1.263 billion tons, the commission said Aug. 27.
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