Coal mining is the process of extracting coal from the ground or from a mine. Coal is valued for its energy content and since the 1880s has been widely used to generate electricity. Steel and cement industries use coal as a fuel for extraction of iron from iron ore and for cement production. In the United Kingdom and South Africa, a coal mine and its structures are a colliery, a coal mine is called a "pit", and above-ground mining structures are referred to as a "pit head". In Australia, "colliery" generally refers to an underground coal mine.
The history of coal mining goes back thousands of years, with early mines documented in ancient China, the Roman Empire and other early historical economies. It became important in the Industrial Revolution of the 19th and 20th centuries, when it was primarily used to power steam engines, heat buildings and generate electricity. Coal mining continues as an important economic activity today, but has begun to decline due to the strong contribution coal plays in global warming and environmental issues, which result in decreasing demand and in some geographies, peak coal.
The Kuznetsk Basin in southwestern Siberia, Russia, is one of the largest coal mining areas in Russia, covering an area of around 10,000 square miles (26,000 km2). It lies in the Kuznetsk Depression between Tomsk and Novokuznetsk in the basin of the Tom River. From the south it borders the Abakan Range, from the west Salair Ridge, and Kuznetsk Alatau from the east.
The Morupule Colliery is a coal mine located in Palapye, Botswana, owned and operated by Debswana, a partnership between the government of Botswana and De Beers. The coalfield is composed of four main seams, only one of which, the No. 1 Seam, is currently being mined, using bord and pillar mining methods.
Coal mining regions are significant resource extraction industries in many parts of the world. They provide a large amount of the fossil fuel energy in the world economy.
The 2007 Zasyadko mine disaster was a mining accident that happened on November 18, 2007 at the Zasyadko coal mine in the eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk.
Zasyadko Mine is a coal mining company in Ukraine's eastern city of Donetsk. Following the start of the War in Donbass in 2014 the mine became situated in rebel controlled territory.
China is the largest producer and consumer of coal and coal power in the world. The share of coal in the Chinese energy mix declined to 55% in 2021 according to the US Energy Information Agency.
Coal in India has been mined since 1774, and India is the second largest producer and consumer of coal after China, mining 777.31 million metric tons in FY 2022. Around 30% of coal is imported. Due to demand, supply mismatch and poor quality with high ash content, India imports coking coal to meet the shortage of domestic supply. Dhanbad, the largest coal producing city, has been called the coal capital of India. State-owned Coal India had a monopoly on coal mining between its nationalisation in 1973 and 2018.
Ukraine operates four nuclear power plants with 15 reactors located in Volhynia and South Ukraine. The total installed nuclear power capacity is over 13 GWe, ranking 7th in the world in 2020. Energoatom, a Ukrainian state enterprise, operates all four active nuclear power stations in Ukraine. In 2019, nuclear power supplied over 20% of Ukraine's energy.
Metal production, in particular iron and steel industry, is the dominant heavy industry in Ukraine. Ukraine is the world's eighth largest producer and third largest exporter of iron and steel (2007). Ukrainian iron and steel industry accounts for around 2% of worldwide crude steel output, 5% to 6% of the national gross domestic product and 34% of Ukrainian export revenue. In 2007 it employed 420,000 people – 10% of industrial labor and 2% of the total workforce. It has the highest, by a wide margin, revealed comparative advantage of all branches of the Ukrainian economy. The industry peaked at 42.8 million tonnes in 2007 but has been gravely affected by the financial crisis of 2007–2010 and declined to 29.8 million tonnes in 2009.
Coal mining in the United Kingdom dates back to Roman times and occurred in many different parts of the country. Britain's coalfields are associated with Northumberland and Durham, North and South Wales, Yorkshire, the Scottish Central Belt, Lancashire, Cumbria, the East and West Midlands and Kent. After 1972, coal mining quickly collapsed and had practically disappeared by the 21st century. The consumption of coal—mostly for electricity—fell from 157 million tonnes in 1970 to 18 million tonnes in 2016, of which 77% was imported from Colombia, Russia, and the United States. Employment in coal mines fell from a peak of 1,191,000 in 1920 to 695,000 in 1956, 247,000 in 1976, 44,000 in 1993, 2,000 in 2015, and to 360 in 2022.
The Ministry of Energy is the main body in the system of central government of Ukraine responsible for realization of electric power-generating state policies; nuclear-industrial, and oil-gas complexes often referred simply as the Fuel-Energy Complex.
Energy in Ukraine is mainly from gas and nuclear, followed by oil and coal. Ukraine has a diversified energy mix, and no fuel takes up more than a third of the country’s energy sources. The coal industry has been disrupted by conflict. Most gas and oil is imported, but since 2015 energy policy has prioritised diversifying energy supply.
Singrauli Coalfield is spread across the districts of Singrauli and Sonebhadra in the Indian states of Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh, mostly in the basin of the Son River.
Coal in Europe is a term describing the use of coal as an energy source in Europe, including both thermal coal used for power generation and coking coal used for steel production.
Shandong Energy Group Co. Ltd. is a state owned coal-mining company headquartered in Jinan, Shandong, China. It is among the seven largest Chinese coal companies. The group was created in March 2011 by merging six existing coal mining companies. These companies included Xinwen Mining Group, Zaozhuang Mining Group, Zibo Mining Group, Feicheng Mining Group, Linyi Mining Group and Longkou Mining Group.
Coal supplies a quarter of Turkey's primary energy. The heavily subsidised coal industry generates over a third of the country's electricity and emits a third of Turkey's greenhouse gases.
"Rotterdam plus" or "Rotterdam+" is a methodology (formula) for determining the steam coal's price for thermal power plants, based on import parity principle, which was used to forecast the wholesale market price of electricity. The formula was in application in Ukraine from May 2016 to June 2019.
The 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine has led to ongoing widespread and possibly serious and long-term environmental damage. The Ukrainian government, journalists and international observers describe the damage as ecocide.
