The latest UN report indicates that coal needs to escape from global energy systems, to avoid severe climate change.
However, for most of the countries in Asia, coal is still a highly used fuel.
A report by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released on August 9 warned of severe weather and said swift action was needed to limit damage.
“This report should be a wake-up call to the use of coal and fossil fuels, before they destroy our planet,” said United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres.
Coal demand and prices are driven by a recovery in power generation, as hot temperatures spur the use of air conditioning.
While this may be a short-term situation, Asia remains the epicenter for the construction of coal-fired generators, with several countries including China and India currently building large capacity. and plans to build more are underway.
And even if coal-fired power generation plans have been canceled or postponed, the alternative is often not to switch to natural gas, which is often in the form of energy-intensive liquefied natural gas (LNG) LNG), rather than renewable energies such as wind and solar.
The scale of Asian coal use is reflected in the volume of coal imports in the region.
A total of 80.32 million tonnes of coal of all kinds were unloaded at Asian ports in July 2021, according to ship and port tracking data from Refinitiv.
This is up from 80.16 million in June and 78.58 million in May, and is the strongest month since January, when winter demand was at its highest.
The total in the 3 months to July 2021 reached 240.06 million tons, up 7.8% compared to 222.79 million in the same period of 2020.
Australia’s premium thermal coal, favored by Asia’s established importers Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, rose to a 13-year high of $153.41 a tonne in the week to 6 and has tripled since the 2020 low of $46.37 in September.
Lower-quality Indonesian thermal coal has been strongly bought by China, rising to $69.53 a tonne in the week to Aug. 6, the highest on record since commodity price reporting agency Argus began assessing prices in 2008.
Source: VITIC/Reuters
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