China taps thinner coal seams as energy security drives push for fossil fuel

China has built a powerful machine for exploiting ultra-thin coal beds, achieving record output with the device as the country turns to harder-to-mine deposits of the fossil fuel to ensure energy security.

The coal seam shearer, developed by the Shanghai Research Institute of China Coal Technology and Engineering Group Corporation (CCTEG), can be used on a coal bed as thin as 1.3 metres (4.3 feet), according to state media.

More than 70 of the machines have been deployed by major coal mining companies in mainland China.

At a mine run by China’s National Energy Group, the device achieved an unprecedented 2.6 million tonnes (2.9 million tons) in annual output, according to a report by state-run newspaper Science and Technology Daily on Tuesday.

China shovels coal on power-security fears, risks climate goals: Greenpeace

It has a designed annual capacity of 3 million tonnes – three times the output of similar machines for mining thin coal beds. These rival devices are also unable to work in seams less than 1.6 metres thick.

The machine has an installed power of 1,200 kilowatts, making it more powerful than its competitors. The device can adjust its orientation and height, and high-precision positioning control technology guides its movement.

Reports of the device first appeared in Chinese state media in late July.

Conditions for coal mining in China have been deteriorating as mining locations with relatively thick coal seams and favourable geological conditions are exhausted.

China puts spotlight back on energy and emission targets for post-Covid rebound

To sustain China’s surging coal consumption, miners had to find ways to extract thinner coal seams, said Kevin Tu, managing director of Agora Energy Transition China, a Beijing-based energy and climate research organisation.

But it has pivoted back towards coal in the past two years because of energy security concerns.

Tu said that although China was undergoing a clean energy transformation, its coal-reliant energy mix could not be changed overnight.

However, for China to achieve its carbon-neutral goal, phasing out coal would still be inevitable in the medium to long term, he said, adding that technological developments in the country’s coal mining activities would not change this trend.

“The stone age did not end because the world ran out of stones, and the oil age will not end because we run out of oil,” he added.

28:58

China, climate change and El Nino: an emerging food, water and power crisis

A huge amount of China’s coal is found in thin seams, accounting for about 20 per cent – or up to 350 billion tonnes – of the country’s total coal reserves, Li Qingliang, a manager at CCTEG’s Shanghai Research Institute, told mainland media.

However, due to poor mining conditions and low profitability, thin coal beds only yield about 7 per cent of the nation’s total coal output.

The new mining machine comes as China accelerates the installation of renewable power facilities to meet its decarbonisation goals.

China has made great progress in developing renewable energy. In 2022, it accounted for 49 per cent of renewable energy capacity added worldwide. It is also by far the leader in putting electric vehicles on the road.

But China is also the top source of carbon dioxide emissions worldwide, generating 12.1 gigatonnes last year – more than twice the quantity generated by the United States and almost a third of the global total. This is largely because it continues to be the world’s largest producer and user of coal.

It is widely accepted that the world will not be able to tackle the climate crisis if China cannot deliver on its zero-carbon goals, including phasing out the use of coal.

China’s economic recovery, concerns about energy security and anxiety over the reliability of solar and wind power generation have contributed to its dependence on the fossil fuel.

China’s coal surge flies in the face of its climate commitments

Last year, local governments approved 106 gigawatts of new coal power capacity – the most since 2015 and four times the amount in 2021.

A report published by the International Energy Agency in July estimated that China’s coal demand would grow 3.5 per cent this year to 4,679 megatonnes – about 56 per cent of global coal demand and far ahead of India, the world’s second-largest coal consumer at 1,212 megatonnes.

A scholar studying China’s energy market, who asked to remain anonymous due to the sensitivity of the matter, said efforts to secure the coal supply in the past two years and a slower-than-expected economic recovery had resulted in a glut of the resource and low prices, which could affect Beijing’s emissions commitments.

In July, President Xi Jinping said at a national conference that China’s commitments to reducing emissions and reaching carbon neutrality “are unswerving” but that “the path towards the goals as well as the manner, pace and intensity of efforts to achieve them should and must be determined by the country itself, rather than swayed by others”.

South China Morning Post