Coal in the News

 
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e.alleg
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Post by e.alleg » Thu. Feb. 07, 2008 10:58 am

http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/coal-outper ... F3571BC%7D
SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Coal, whose price surge has already outrun those of crude oil and natural gas, is generating an even louder buzz as a rash of bad weather has reduced its production globally.
Citigroup earlier this week raised its forecast for thermal coal, saying it now expects prices for the benchmark product to double this year as blizzards in China, power outages in South Africa, and floods in Queensland cut into global output. Meanwhile, demand for coal keeps rising as the world's electricity use expands.


 
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beatle78
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Post by beatle78 » Thu. Feb. 07, 2008 6:43 pm

is nothing sacred!!!!

We work hard to keep our heating costs down by using coal..... I wonder how this will affect the prices in Penn. since we all get our coal from there.

I would hate to have to abandon coal and go back to WOOD!!!!..... that's sooooo much more work than coal stokers :)

 
hell fire
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Post by hell fire » Thu. Feb. 07, 2008 7:07 pm

i don't think that will bother us with the coal we burn in our stoves. most plants use anthracite dust or bit. pa. still has many many years of good ole coal left. :D

 
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coaledsweat
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Post by coaledsweat » Thu. Feb. 07, 2008 7:23 pm

hell fire wrote:pa. still has many many years of good ole coal left. :D
About 400 years worth. :)

 
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beatle78
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Post by beatle78 » Thu. Feb. 07, 2008 8:54 pm

:clap: sweet!!! I would be ROYALLY tee'd off if I bought a stoker boiler and my cost savings approached $0.

 
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CoalHeat
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Post by CoalHeat » Thu. Feb. 07, 2008 11:06 pm

coaledsweat wrote:
hell fire wrote:pa. still has many many years of good ole coal left. :D
About 400 years worth. :)
You saying that in 400 years my stoves will be useless?
What are we supposed to do then???

 
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Richard S.
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Post by Richard S. » Thu. Feb. 07, 2008 11:24 pm

The market will dictate the price, whether it will effect anthracite prices is a toss up. Power plants are not going to use anthracite for power production but keep in mind these companies are in business to make money and if they can ship it overseas for a premium they will certainly do it. I posted an article a few weeks back where they had an order that amounted to millions of dollars. If the market for that continues to rise so will the cost of the anthracite.


 
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Scottscoaled
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Post by Scottscoaled » Thu. Feb. 07, 2008 11:49 pm

Youse guys fight this the wrong way. would't it be better to buy coal futures and make money on the rising "surge "? Seems like the 1000 members here could come up with an idea to pool their resourses and win both ways. One by being a smart consumer, and secondly by using group funds to make profit. Interesting idea? I know NY is revisiting its power plant siting laws as power use is expected to overtake production within a short time. As nuclear power is not an option, the only choice that has merit is anthracite. Much easier to regulate the pollution with smokeless. Wind power is a cool Idea, If the wind blows. Solar power,,,,, you get the idea. Natural gas, we all have some.All the good land is taken already. All those railroad tracks and no trains. Scott

 
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Richard S.
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Post by Richard S. » Fri. Feb. 08, 2008 1:33 am

stokerscot wrote: As nuclear power is not an option, the only choice that has merit is anthracite. Much easier to regulate the pollution with smokeless.
Even if they could mine every last piece there isn't enough anthracite available to even consider doing that. And they can't mine it, consider the Wyoming Valley which is all but useless for mines below the level of the river. Other places where it could be mined are below well built up communities. These communties flourished because of the anthracite industry but ironically now prevent it from being mined. The Anthrcite avaiable below ground in the Wyoming Valley is an astonomical amount but they can't get to it for both of those reasons stated.

Only power generation from coal is going to be from bit.

 
mwcougar
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Post by mwcougar » Fri. Feb. 08, 2008 2:38 am

wyoming coal... if the price is right.... the feds showed after the knox mine disaster ...they can pump the mines down ...I would think that if the price goes high enough someone would put pumps back .... treat the water.... that is now acid run off.... and mine the coal and make everyone happy..... The feds did not keep the pumps going becuase of cost effectiveness. and the anthracite mining dying seen no reason to. so they left it all fill back up.

 
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coaledsweat
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Post by coaledsweat » Fri. Feb. 08, 2008 8:06 am

Industry is geared to bituminous for cost reasons so I don't think there will be a big rush to anthracite. There will be more pressure on it from residential heating and water filtering needs as the cost of other fuels are rising and the water needs create a larger demand for treatment. The key to the price is like any other commodity and will vary with demand and supply, that should not change very much from its historical pattern. An increase in demand will increase the price. That will open up more operations as the profit levels make it affordable. There is plenty of it left, if its worth while to dig it up someone will make money doing just that. We just get to buy and burn the stuff. 8-)

Almost any news about coal in the media is about bituminous anyway unless it is specific to the NEPA region itself. :)

 
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Yanche
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Post by Yanche » Fri. Feb. 08, 2008 10:01 am

I think the largest new demand for Anthracite coal will come from Germany. They are closing their hard coal (Anthracite) mines because of high government subsidies and environment costs. Their need for Anthracite is still there and they will buy from the USA. As they dismantle their collieries my guess is some of the coal processing equipment will end up in PA. Hopefully, the increase in demand and the increase in production capability will keep prices relatively stable or only slowly rising. I would also guess that the German coal processing, cleaning, grading, etc. is top quality and would make larger strip mining of Anthracite cost effective. Unless there are new mechanical methods of Anthracite deep mining developed, it will likely be gone in a few decades.

Does anyone know the primary use of Anthracite coal in Germany? Residential heating, central heating, steel manufacturing, etc.?
Last edited by Yanche on Fri. Feb. 08, 2008 8:33 pm, edited 1 time in total.

 
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coaledsweat
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Post by coaledsweat » Fri. Feb. 08, 2008 10:42 am

It looks like there consumption is about 1% anthracite, not a very scarry number for us. :)

http://www.oilgasarticles.com/articles/47/1/Coal- ... Page1.html

 
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Berlin
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Post by Berlin » Fri. Feb. 08, 2008 11:52 am

I'm not sure that article is entirely accurate. I remember hearing hard coal production was much higher, however they may have included what that article called "german bituminous"; this coal in the US would be considered semi-anthracite, as germany has basically NO bituminous as we know it, only lignite and "hard coal" aka anthracite. I have personally been to a number of very large .4GW and larger powerplants that fire smokeless "hard coal"; whether that coal is currently being obtained from germany or elswhere i'm not sure, but i'm pretty certain that the COMBUSTION of hard coal accounts for way more than 1% of german coal use, regardless of where it's from (probably the ukrane/ southern russia, lots of high ash anthracite there).

 
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1975gt750
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Post by 1975gt750 » Thu. Feb. 14, 2008 10:23 am

just read in the wall steet journal that china is in need of coal and it is running the price up of austrailian coal .also stated the coal prices worldwide will rise. has anybody else heard this news and how high do you think it will go up in price pe ton


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