Environmental Implications of Expanded Coal Utilization: a Study By: The Beijer Institute The United Nations Environment Programme The U.S.S.R. Academy of Sciences

By M.J. Chadwick

Environmental Implications of Expanded Coal Utilization focuses on the increasing consideration of coal as an alternative source of energy. This book comes as an answer to the issues on health and environment regarding the extraction, production, and use of coal. Composed of nine chapters, the selection starts by underlining the potential prospects for coal, which plays a vital role in meeting energy demands. The book also shows that problems have evolved regarding the use of coal, including land disturbance and increased land occupation due to mining. The text also notes that the international trade of coal will surely generate waste products, and some of which can be the result of poor transportation and handling. The book focuses on coal gasification and liquefaction and emphasizes that the processes involved must be carefully understood in order to avoid the environmental impacts of coal use. Attempts have been made to establish a conceptual framework to be used in assessing the health and environmental health impacts of the conversion and utilization of coal. Relative to this, discussions that follow include the trace elements that are the products of coal combustion and conversion and also coal derived carbon compounds. Another sector is focused on the evaluation of the effects of emissions on human health, especially of workers in the industry. The effects of the utilization of coal on communities are also considered. The text is a vital source of information to those involved in the research on the use of coal as alternative source of energy.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Elsevier Science
• Release date: Oct 22, 2013
• ISBN: 9781483146577

Book preview

1

Coal in the Future World Energy Scene

Publisher Summary

This chapter discusses coal in the future world energy scene. World energy requirement increased with rapid economic progress at about 4% per year for the 1950s and 1960s, but the total coal production at only 2% over this period. Solid fuels at present account for not more than 30% of the total world energy supply. Coal accounts for 30% of the world’s energy supply, 40% of electricity production, and 70% of the fuel for traditional thermal power stations and is also the supplier for the iron and steel industry. Coal supplies to industry and domestic households account for nearly 40% of its market. The predicted consumption will only utilize up to 5–10% of the coal capital by the end of this century. The price of the coal per thermal unit at present is one-third that of oil. The coal industry is an industry based on labor which is condemned to decreasing yield and increasing costs.

1 Introduction

2 The Energy Crisis and New Economic and Demographic Prospects

3 Coal in the Future World Energy Scene

4 Development Prospects for the Coal Market

4.1 Coal Consumption

4.1.1 Electricity

4.1.2 Iron and steel

4.1.3 Other sectors: industry, district heating, conversion and chemical feedstocks

4.2 Coal Reserves and Production

4.3 World Trade

5 Economic and Strategic Aspects of Coal Development

5.1 Prices and Costs

5.2 Operator Strategies

6 Coal Prospects

7 References

1 Introduction

The utilization of coal as an energy source, both by means of the steam engine and in the form of coke, was a major characteristic of the first Industrial Revolution. It was on coal that nations built their industrial power in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. As early as 1860, Great Britain was producing over 80 million tons of pit-coal, and it is probably not an exaggeration to say that, with the control of the oceans and overseas dominions, coal made her the dominant industrial power for several decades. Until the First World War it was the main coal-producing nations that held the world’s key positions. In 1913 Great Britain, Germany, France and the U.S.A. between them produced almost 90% of the coal extracted in the whole world, and this production accounted for virtually all the world’s energy supply. Throughout previous decades a 3% annual growth rate bore witness to the vigour of the industrial boom. Oil, however, was beginning to appear on the American market, and its use as a fuel was inconspicuously preparing the way for what was later to be one of the great mutations of the energy market.

Subsequently, the world entered a long period of disorder and trouble. There were two World Wars, an unprecedented energy crisis, and a massive invasion of oil into the energy market of the United States, which became the leading producer and exporter. The result of this shift to oil was a reduction in the share of coal in the world’s commercial energy consumption from 61% in 1950 to 51% in 1960 and 35% in 1970. The major transition took place in the mid-1960s. By 1967 oil had overtaken coal’s global market share. This pattern was not uniform throughout the world; in the U.S.S.R. rapid industrial expansion continued to be founded on