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July 13, 2006
US Coal Imports Spike
Despite the fact that the USA has the world's largest reserves of coal, imports of coal to the states has spiked dramatically since 1999. According to Mark Clayton of the CS Monitor, the US is now importing 30.5 million tons of coal per year, compared to 9 million tons in 1999. Most of the coal imports feature low sulfur content while allows power plants to meet emission standards without extra exhaust filtration. Utilities are finding it cheaper to import coal from South America by ship than from domestic sources in Wyoming and Appalachia. Even with this jump, imports currently account for just 4 % of US coal consumption.Coal, like oil, comes in several different grades. The quality of the coal and the ease of mining it varies greatly from deposit to deposit. As such, some stated coal reserves may be the 'tar sands' or 'oil shale' of coal. An example is Germany, which has significant coal reserves but little mining. The bulk of the quality coal has already been mined, leaving only the variety that is more expensive to extract in place.
Posted by dymaxion at July 13, 2006 07:05 PM