Coal Supply Sustainability in China: A New Comprehensive Evaluation Methodology

Coal is a major source of energy in China. Quantifying China’s coal supply sustainability is essential to track China’s efforts towards sustainable development and achieve carbon neutrality goals. In this research, in addition to availability, economic sustainability, environmental sustainability and technological sustainability, we specially considered health and security, and transport sustainability of China’s coal supply. We select 19 indicators from the above six dimensions to build a coal supply sustainability index and construct a novel optimized comprehensive evaluation model with level difference maximization to evaluate China’s coal supply sustainability. The results showed that the policies issued by the Chinese government have effectively improved coal supply sustainability. China’s coal supply sustainability level has improved significantly, with the figure nearly doubling from 0.338 in 2000 to 0.7004 in 2019. To improve the sustainability of China’s coal supply further fundamentally, it is still necessary to improve energy diversification. Since phasing out China’s coal reliance requires considerable time, the Chinese government needs to introduce more positive and effective policies to such as increase the research and development support for carbon capture, utilization and storage technology, etc. to improve the sustainability of coal supply. The results of this research presented in this paper will have reference value for both promoting the sustainable development of China and other coal-consuming countries in the world.

Assessment of coal supply and use in the development of gold deposits in the Arctic zone of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia)

The article considers various options for providing gold mining enterprises in the Arctic zone of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) with fuel and energy resources to generate electricity for industrial needs. The authors assess the possibility of organizing the power supply for the operation of the mines using the resources of local coal deposits. The Soginsky brown coal and Krasnorechensk coal deposits are most suitable for mining. The research proves that the use of coal in generation can reduce the cost of power supply in the development of ore and placer deposits. They determined that the lowest unit cost of electricity generation is achieved when brown coal from the Kularski deposit is used as fuel (9.3 rub/kW·h). The use of coals from the Soginsky deposit is 20% more expensive than the Kularsky coals, but the quality characteristics of the coal and the readiness of the deposit for mining are significantly better. The most accessible, but more expensive option for organizing the supply of coal to gold deposits is the use of imported coal of the required quality. The authors outline the necessity of additional appraisal of coal resource potential of the Arctic zone of Yakutia on the base of contemporary economic criteria. There is a need to clarify the extent of coal production and to determine the importance of coal in investment projects in the northeast of Arctic zone of Yakutia.

COAL MINING COMPLEX IN THE BAIKAL-AMUR RAILWAY AREA: STATE AND PROSPECTS FOR DEVELOPMENT

The analysis of the state, prospects and problems for the development of the coal mining complex in the area of the Baikal-Amur railway is carried out. The information on the developed and planned for the development of coal deposits in the region is presented. The market requirements for the quality of solid fuel are considered. It is shown that the current documents of the federal and regional levels, which determine the strategy of the enterprises that carry out or plan their work in the field of mining, enrichment and supply of coal to consumers, require additional approval and clarification. The systematic approach used allows us to identify such inconsistencies and consider the possibilities of correction. Measures are proposed to improve the efficiency of the coal complex enterprises. The problem of improving the efficiency and competitiveness of coal supply chains is considered. The role and place of quality management of coal products in order to achieve planned goals are indicated.

Strategies of Two-Level Green Technology Investments for Coal Supply Chain under Different Dominant Modes

We consider a coal supply chain with a coal enterprise and a manufacturer, where the coal enterprise invests in clean coal technology, and the manufacturer invests in carbon reduction technology. The government offers subsidies for the investments of clean coal technology and carbon reduction technology. We examine optimal clean coal technology inputs in a coal enterprise and carbon reduction quantity in a manufacturer under the modes of coal-enterprise-led and manufacturer-led, respectively, using a Stackelberg game theory model. We obtain some interesting results. First, carbon reduction by the manufacturer is restrained when clean coal technology cost and carbon reduction cost are increased, regardless of the dominant modes, and clean coal technology input decreases when clean coal technology cost increases; however, a high carbon reduction cost has no effect on clean coal technology input when the manufacturer leads. Second, the clean coal technology subsidy for coal enterprises promotes clean coal technology inputs and carbon reductions, and the carbon reduction subsidy encourages carbon reduction without supporting clean coal technology input. Last, carbon reduction performance is better achieved under the manufacturer-led model than the coal-enterprise-led model. However, it should be noticed that the capital resource only relies on government subsidy in this article. In the future, this study could be used for green supply chain investment, and could be helpful for sustainability development.