Kazakhstan increases coal production due to high demand from Europe | Popgen Tech

ASTANA – Kazakhstan has increased its coal production to meet European demand, says the Coal 2022 report by the International Energy Agency (IEA) released on 16 December.

Photo credit: el24.kz

“Kazakhstan’s coal production will rise to 108 million tons (+4.5 percent) in 2022 due to increased demand from Europe, especially Poland, to replace Russian coal. We expect Kazakh coal reserves to expand by 3 percent to 111 million tons by 2025,” the report said.

To compare, Kazakhstan’s coal production last year stood at a steady 103 million tonnes.

The growth in demand for Kazakh coal increased due to the sanctions imposed by Europe against Russia, the report said. The ban on the purchase of Russian coal and natural gas allowed the European countries to import the coal only until August 10, after which they turned to alternative sources.

Poland imported 1.1 million tons of coal over the first 10 months of 2022, compared to only 71,700 tons last year. Latvia and Estonia bought 213,400 and 72,400 tons, as they did not buy coal from Kazakhstan in previous years. The largest importer of Kazakh coal is Switzerland, which imported 6.2 million tons of coal since the beginning of the year, compared to 3.4 million last year.

“Global coal demand will increase only marginally (by 1.2 percent) in 2022, but enough to peak amid the energy crisis, according to a new IEA report that predicts world coal consumption will remain the same. levels in the following years in the absence of stronger efforts to accelerate the transition to clean energy,” the report said.

The IEA is an international agency that provides analysis and policy recommendations to help countries ensure sustainable and affordable energy access. It considers both traditional energy sources such as coal, oil and gas, as well as renewable energy.

Coal 2022 provides an analysis of coal demand, supply, trade, costs and prices, as well as forecasts of trends through 2025.