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Global thermal coal exports and power use to hit new highs in 2024: Maguire Global exports and use of thermal coal will reach all-time highs in 2024, despite the record roll-out of renewable energy generation capacity across all major continents. Exports of thermal coal through the first 11 months of 2024 are up by 9 million metric tons from the same months in 2023, per Kpler ship-tracking data, and will climb further in December as power firms stock up for the Northern hemisphere winter. Global coal-fired power generation is up by around 2% to new highs so far in 2024, while coal-fired power emissions are also at a record, data from energy think tank Ember shows. The continued expansion in coal imports and use underscores the difficulty of dislodging fossil fuels from energy systems, and may disappoint those hoping for a peak in coal burning. However, climate advocates can take heart from the slowing pace of export growth, which at only 1% marks the smallest annual expansion since 2020, when COVID-19 lockdowns sparked a rare contraction in worldwide energy output. Climate watchdogs may also be cheered by annual declines in coal imports by several of the largest coal-consuming nations, which if repeated next year could trigger falls in coal exports from 2025. Below are the key countries that have helped lift coal exports to record highs in 2024, and will be the main drivers of coal purchases and use in the years ahe

Hefty US thermal coal exports look set to keep climbing in 2025 U.S. coal traders have exported the highest volume of thermal coal in six years over the first eleven months of 2024, and look set to ship out even greater volumes in 2025 once President-elect Donald Trump takes office. U.S. exports of coal used in power generation hit 32.6 million short tons from January through November, according to ship-tracking data from Kpler. That was the highest volume for that period since 2018, and will have generated roughly $4 billion in revenues for the U.S. coal sector, according to price data published by the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA). As thermal coal consumption is being phased out at home due to concerns about pollution, those hefty exports have served to undermine U.S. credibility as a climate leader. But export volumes could be even higher in 2025 if the incoming fossil fuel-friendly administration of President Donald Trump promotes the extraction and sale of more U.S. energy products as expected. POLLUTING POWER Coal is by far the highest polluting fossil fuel, and will generate roughly 10 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) globally this year when burned for power, according to Ember. Roughly 945,000 tons of CO2 is emitted for each terawatt hour (TWh) of electricity produced by coal-fired power stations globally this year. That compares to around 604,000 tons for each TWh produced by natural gas-fired plants, which is a major reason why U.S. power providers have phased out coal burning and boosted the use of natural gas in power generation over the past decade. Several countries - including China, India, the Philippines, Vietnam and Turkey - rely on coal for 40% or more of their generation mix, and must import a fair chunk of their annual coal needs.

Coal export from Russia could decline in 2024 - Energy Ministry The Russian Energy Ministry sees deterioration in the dynamic of export of coal from Russia this year, Russian Energy Minister Sergei Tsivilyov told Interfax on the sidelines of the 21st United Russia Congress on Saturday. "This year, there is a little time left [until the year-end], we see deterioration in the dynamic of coal export. This is why we are taking all possible measures to ensure we did not have this sad trend next year," Tsivilyov said, answering a question about the forecast of parameters this year. Answering a question about the expectations for 2025, he said, "We are just determining the opportunity for export, for delivering it to the consumption markets now." "The situation is quite difficult now, everything depends on the return of payments, the movement of vessels, many factors," he said. As reported, Russia mined 438 million tonnes of coal and exported 213 million tonnes in 2023.

World’s Coal Demand at Record High in 2024, IEA Says Global coal demand has surged to another record high this year, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said on Wednesday, expecting the world’s coal consumption to level off through 2027. The year 2024 saw another all-time high consumption of coal globally, beating the previous record set last year, the IEA said in its Coal 2024 report with analysis and forecast to 2027. Last year, coal demand grew by 2.6% to hit an all-time high, the IEA said in a July overview of the coal markets. Back then, the agency expected coal demand for 2024 to remain broadly flat compared to 2023. This year, coal demand is on track to increase by 1% from 2023 to 8.77 billion tons, a record high, the IEA said today. While coal demand continues to decline in the EU and the U.S. – although at slower paces than in 2023, China and India are set to see in 2024 another year of record-high coal consumption. China is on track for a 1% rise to 4.9 billion tons, and India’s coal demand is poised to increase by more than 5% to 1.3 billion tons—a level that only China has reached previously. Over the next three years, global coal consumption will remain close to the 2024 record-high levels, said the agency, which advocates strongly for an acceleration of the energy transition. The IEA projects, and hopes, that coal demand will plateau through 2027 even as global electricity consumption spikes, thanks to rising renewable energy capacity additions. A plateau in global coal demand will largely depend on China, the agency noted. “Weather factors – particularly in China, the world’s largest coal consumer – will have a major impact on short-term trends for coal demand. The speed at which electricity demand grows will also be very important over the medium term,” said IEA Director of Energy Markets and Security Keisuke Sadamori. Although the share of coal in China’s electricity generation has been declining in recent years with the renewables boom, Chinese coal power generation and demand remains strong. Coal still accounts for about 60% of China’s power generation, despite a surge in hydropower earlier this year after abundant rainfall.

Global coal demand is set to plateau through 2027 After reaching a new high in 2024, global demand for coal is set to level off in the coming years as a surge in renewable power helps to meet soaring demand for electricity around the world, according to an IEA report out today. Coal 2024 – the new edition of the IEA’s annual coal market report, which analyses the latest trends and updates medium-term forecasts – shows that global coal use has rebounded strongly after plummeting at the height of the pandemic. It is poised to rise to 8.77 billion tonnes in 2024, a record. According to the report, demand is set to stay close to this level through 2027 as renewable energy sources play a greater role in generating power and coal consumption levels off in China. The electricity sector in China is particularly important to global coal markets, with one out of every three tonnes of coal consumed worldwide burned at a power plant in the country. In 2024, China continued to diversify its power sector, advance the construction of nuclear plants and accelerate its huge expansion of solar PV and wind capacity. This should help limit increases in coal consumption through 2027, according to the report, though it also highlights a number of key uncertainties in its analysis. Electricity use in a number of countries, including China, is growing at a strong pace due to a combination of factors, including the electrification of services like transport and heating, rising demand for cooling, and increasing consumption from emerging sectors such as data centres. Additionally, weather patterns could drive fluctuations in coal consumption in the short term. According to the report, coal demand in China by 2027 could be up to 140 million tonnes higher or lower than forecast due to weather-related variability in renewable generation. “The rapid deployment of clean energy technologies is reshaping the global electricity sector, which accounts for two-thirds of the world’s coal use. As a result, our models show global demand for coal plateauing through 2027 even as electricity consumption rises sharply,” said IEA Director of Energy Markets and Security Keisuke Sadamori. “However, weather factors – particularly in China, the world’s largest coal consumer – will have a major impact on short-term trends for coal demand. The speed at which electricity demand grows will also be very important over the medium term.” In most advanced economies, coal demand has already peaked and is expected to keep decreasing through 2027. The pace of decline will continue to depend on the enactment of strong policies, such as those implemented in the European Union, and the availability of alternative power sources, including cheap natural gas in the United States and Canada. Meanwhile, demand for coal is still increasing in some emerging economies where electricity demand is rising sharply along with economic and population growth, such as India, Indonesia and Viet Nam. In emerging economies, growth is mainly driven by coal demand from the power sector, although industrial use is also going up.

Police in Finland are transferring the seized oil tanker Eagle S closer to land as they step up their investigation into damage caused to undersea cables this week. The operation to move the vessel to Svartbeck, an anchorage near the port of Kilpilahti, was scheduled to begin at 10:50 a.m. local time on Saturday, authorities said in a statement. The Helsinki Police Department is taking the lead, supported by Finland’s Border Guard. Finland’s National Bureau of Investigation detained the vessel, sailing under the Cook Islands flag, two days ago after discovering damage to a subsea power link and several data cables as it probes for possible aggravated criminal mischief. Authorities believe the ship’s anchor, which they found to be missing, severed the 170-kilometer (105-mile) electricity line that connects Finland and Estonia. Since then, four underwater data cables have also been experiencing disruptions. “The new location offers a better option for carrying out investigative measures,” the police said in the statement. On-board operations by the authorities were to be suspended for the time of the transfer and resumed once the vessel is at anchor. Police have set up a one-nautical-mile exclusion zone around the tanker, and a no-fly zone is currently in effect around Sköldvik Bay, they said. Kilpilahti is also where Neste Oyj’s Porvoo oil refinery is located. Eagle S is part of the Russian shadow fleet transporting its oil, and was carrying a full load of unleaded gasoline, Finnish police said earlier. The Eagle S was loaded with transmitting and receiving devices that effectively allowed it to become a “spy ship” for Russia, the specialist shipping publication Lloyd’s List reported on Friday, citing a source who wasn’t identified familiar with a vessel that provided commercial maritime services to the tanker in recent months. The hi-tech equipment on the Eagle S was abnormal for a merchant ship and consumed more power from the ship’s generator, leading to repeated blackouts, it cited the source as saying.

In 2025, we estimate global coal demand to enter a trend reversal after four years of growth, decreasing slightly by 0.3% to a total of 8 714 Mt. A key reason for this is that China, which has traditionally driven coal demand growth, is likely to show its first decline in coal demand since 2016. This combined with ongoing declines in the European Union, United States, Japan, Korea, and other parts of the world, is expected to outweigh continuous growth in India and ASEAN. Global coal consumption is highly driven by developments in the power sector, which currently accounts for more than two-thirds of global coal use. Within the power sector, coal demand is highly affected by weather. Fluctuations in weather conditions influence both the supply and demand side, particularly relating to the growing capacities of weather-dependent renewable energy sources and ongoing electrification. Additionally, fundamental drivers, such as the production of clean energy technologies like electric vehicles or global trends like AI propelling demand from data centres, will have a significant impact on electricity demand, and in turn, coal demand in the coming years. Indeed, policies to phase out coal and reduced support for coal from institutions like banks or insurers in many parts of the world are going to put further pressure on coal demand. Regionally, the expected decline in coal demand in developed economies and the growth in some emerging countries seems certain, leaving China as the largest source of uncertainty, potentially deciding the global trend for coal demand. For 2025, we estimate Chinese coal demand in the power sector to decline by 1.1%, since renewables are likely to outgrow power demand. However, this forecast comes with caveats regarding electricity demand, hydropower output and solar PV curtailment rates. If there are no remarkable changes in coal demand for non-power applications, China is estimated to show a reduction by 49 Mt in 2025, contributing the most to the reduction in global coal demand. On 15 July, 2024, China issued the Action Plan for Low-Carbon Coal Power Transformation (2024-2027), which supports three key technologies to reduce CO2 emissions from coal plants: biomass, ammonia co-firing and Carbon, Capture, Utilisation and Storage. This Plan will affect coal consumption in China from 2025 onwards, but it is too early to make a detailed assessment of the impact, so it is not included in this report. Further reductions in coal demand are estimated to occur in the United States (-8 Mt or -2.0%) and in the European Union (-9 Mt or -3.0%) given the region’s ongoing efforts to phase out coal. In India, the rise of renewables will likely not cover the growth in power demand. Therefore, we expect coal plants to capture part of the growth. Given India’s rising demand for coal in industrial applications, we estimate aggregate coal demand to increase by 3.1% to 1 371 Mt in 2025. In 2024, India aims to commission 14 GW of new coal-fired capacity, more than four times the annual average in the last five years. Likewise, coal demand in ASEAN is estimated to grow by 3.0% in 2025.

Poor 2024 harvest extends impact on ethanol Extreme weather conditions created significant challenges for Europe's corn harvest in 2024. In the third and fourth quarters, European ethanol market participants reported problems accessing corn feedstock. A producer expected the corn feedstock difficulties to remain in 2025 and added that feedstock prices will continue to be high in 2025 compared with US corn. In Hungary, crop quality was an additional concern as extended periods of elevated temperatures led to toxin contamination. "Between Austria and Romania ... [the corn] has a lot of disease," another producer said. "It's very hard to find stable corn with favorable NUTS02 values and we don't see the crop situation improving in 2025. "If we have a limited amount of corn, it means it's going to be prioritized for food." Another source said "bad" corn in Hungary was being used to produce waste-based double-counting ethanol amid reports of an increase of second-generation ethanol on the market, which might continue in 2025. The US Department of Agriculture trimmed corn production estimates for the European Union for the marketing year 2024-25 (July-June) in its latest World Agricultural Supply and Demand report released Dec. 10. The EU corn production forecast was 58 million mt in MY 2024-25, lower from 58.8 million mt in November. "EU corn production is down, reflecting reductions for Italy, Romania, Croatia and Austria that are partially offset by increases for Poland, Spain and France," the USDA said. Amid reduced production, EU corn imports are forecast to increase by 500,000 mt month on month to 19.5 million mt. "Europe is already importing US corn at this moment, so there will be some US corn in 2025," the first producer said.

Global coal demand to reach record high in 2024 – IEA The energy sector will stimulate consumption growth Global demand for coal will rise to an all-time high of 8.77 billion tons in 2024, the International Energy Agency (IEA) predicts in its report. At the same time, it is expected that the growth rate in 2024 will slow down compared to previous years – to 1% yoy. For example, in 2023, this figure increased by 2.4% year-on-year. The main driver of coal demand growth will be the energy sector, where coal-fired electricity production should reach a historic high of 10,700 TWh by the end of the year. According to the IEA, coal demand in China is expected to grow by 1% y/y in 2024 to another record of 4.9 billion tons, and in India – by more than 5% y/y – to 1.3 billion tons. In the EU and the US, coal demand continues to fall, but the decline has slowed. By the end of the year, it will decline by 12% and 5%, respectively, compared to 23% and 17% in 2023. Over the next three years, the agency predicts that global coal demand is likely to stabilize, reaching 8.87 billion tons by 2027. Demand for coal in developed countries continues to decline. However, this is expected to be offset by the opposite trend in several transition and developing countries. For example, the use of coal-fired power plants in India, Indonesia, and Vietnam will increase due to the need for additional energy, which is related to economic growth. In 2024, China is focused on diversifying its energy sources, continuing to build nuclear power plants and accelerating the expansion of solar and wind capacity. In addition, the country’s hydropower industry rebounded after several years of poor performance. Nevertheless, electricity demand in China is growing rapidly, on average outpacing GDP growth since 2021. The main factors are the electrification of services, as well as the needs of new industries such as data centers. Global coal production is expected to reach a historic peak of over 9 billion tons in 2024. According to IEA estimates, in 2024, strong demand pushed international coal trade, including thermal and metallurgical grades, to a new high of 1.55 billion tons. In particular, China’s coal imports may exceed 500 million tons in 2024 compared to 474.4 million tons in 2023. In October, WorldSteel downgraded its short-term forecast for global steel demand in 2024. Volumes are expected to decline by 0.9% compared to 2023 to 1.75 billion tons, while the previous forecast assumed a 1.7% y/y increase – to 1.79 billion.

Nearly 100,000 Tonnes of Russian Fertilizers Remain Blocked in European Ports, Says Uralchem CEO Uralchem Group is one of the largest mineral fertilizer companies in Russia and Eastern Europe. Through its ownership of Uralkali, the world's largest producer of potash fertilizers, Uralchem controls Russia's largest ammonia producer and one of the world's leading urea producers, Togliattiazot. About 100 thousand tonnes of Russian fertilizers remain blocked in European ports, but humanitarian deliveries continue and amounted to about 200 thousand tonnes, said Dmitry Konyaev, CEO of Uralchem. "At the moment we have delivered about 200,000 tonnes [of humanitarian aid]. The geography is quite extensive – we are really looking at the regions where the most difficult situation with food security is taking shape... About 100,000 tonnes of fertilizers remain blocked in European ports," Konyaev told Russian media. The last shipment of fertilizers within the humanitarian mission of Uralchem, in the volume of 55,000 tonnes, which was in the waters of the Gulf of Riga since the beginning of 2022, left the Latvian port on October 18 and arrived in Sri Lanka in December 2024. Since the end of 2022, Uralchem Group has sent about 190,000 tonnes of its fertilizers to developing countries free of charge after paying sea freight and other transportation costs, the producer said. More than 166,000 tonnes of this volume were delivered from European ports with the help of the UN World Food Programme (WFP) – to Malawi, Kenya, Nigeria, Zimbabwe, and now to Sri Lanka, contributing to the realization of the UN Sustainable Development Goal N2 - "to end hunger in all its forms by 2030 and achieve food security."