Coal Running Out
Coal Running Out, Prices to Soar, Nature Reports (Correct)
Nov.23(Bloomberg) -- Economic global coal reserves will run out fasterthanexpected because of overly optimistic estimates and acceleratingdemand,leading to a surge in prices, Nature magazine reported in its Nov. 18 issue.
“Theinevitableresult of soaring demand and dwindling supply will be risingcoal pricesglobally, even in nations that are currentlyself-sufficient in theresources,” Richard Heinberg and David Fridley,fellows at the Post Carbon Institute in Santa Rosa, California wrote in an article in the magazine. “Energy policies relying on cheap coal have no future.”
China lastyear imported a record amount of coking coal, used forsteelmaking,while India almost doubled purchases of energy coal for itspowerstations, pushing takeover activity in the sector.
China, the world’s biggest producer and consumer of coal, has coal resources of 187 billion metric tons, second to the US ,accordingto data collected in the 2000-10 national resource survey byChina’sMinistry of Land and Resources, or about 62 years’ worth ofcoal,according to Heinberg and Findley.
“But the overwhelmingglobaltrend, as revealed by national coal surveys over the past fewdecades, isfor the size of countries’ estimated reserves to shrink asgeologistsuncover restrictions,” Heinberg and Fridley said. “Coalconsumption isaccelerating fast. This renders meaninglessreserves-lifetime figurescalculated on the basis of flat demand.”
Thepeak of world coalsupply “may be only years” away as the world’shighest quality and mostaccessible coal reserves are depleted in lightof growing demand,Heinberg and Fridley said, citing scientific studies.