Environment & Energy
Related: About this forumIndia On Track To Become Worlds #1 Coal Burner; Domestic Natgas Production Falling Rapidly
India is burning coal in power plants at the fastest pace in 31 years. At the same time, domestic supplies of natural gas that are the main alternative are falling at the quickest rate in Asia, data from 2012 compiled by BP Plc (BP/) show. Both trends run counter to those in most major economies and give India clout over global coal prices.
ndias growing appetite for imported coal should benefit suppliers in the $69 billion global coal trade such as BHP Billiton Ltd. (BHP) (BHP) and Indonesias PT Adaro Energy (ADRO). India is set to eclipse China as the top importer of power station coal by 2014, as China burned the fuel in 2012 at the slowest pace since 2008, and U.S. demand fell for a second year, according to Energy Aspects Ltd.
India is increasingly becoming an important swing factor in the coal markets and exporters will look there for price support as Chinese imports slow, said Michael Parker, a Hong Kong-based analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. Chinese imports will start to fall as they use more of their own coal. As Asias second-biggest energy consumer, with an economy expanding 5 percent last year, India used 10.2 percent more coal from a year earlier. That was the sharpest rise since 1981 and reversed three years of slower gains, according to this months BP Statistical Review 2013.
EDIT
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-06-27/india-to-eclipse-china-as-world-s-coal-power-buoying-bhp.html
GliderGuider
(21,088 posts)that Tata was switching entirely to wind power! That India's renewable resource wasn't just people any more!
What happened?