Coal Stockpiles at China main ports rebound to 13 million tonnes

Wednesday, 23 Nov 2011

Coal inventories at the four major harbors around Bohai Sea increased to 13.877 million tonnes due to severe weather in the week ending November 20 up by 16.11% or 1.926 million tonnes marking the highest growth at record.

Coal Stocks at Major Ports around Bohai Sea during November 14 to 20 2011

Port	Coal Stocks	Up/Down	Growth%
Qinhuangdao port	687	104.7	17.98
Jingtang port	226	36	18.94
SDIC Caofeidian port	240	35	17.07
Tianjin port	234.7	16.9	7.75

(In 10,000 tonnes)

Industry sources said that coal stocks at the four ports will fall slightly once weather turns better and thermal coal prices are expected to edge down accordingly.

(source: steelhome.cn/en)

Coal Stockpiles at China's Main Ports Decline After 5 Weeks of Increase

Friday, Nov18,2011

Coal inventories at the four major harbors around Bohai Sea witnessed a fall after rising for five weeks in a row.

Coal stockpiles at the four major harbors decreased to 11.951 million tonnes in the week ending November 13, down 2.24 percent or 274,000 tonnes from 12.225 million tonnes in the previous week.

Coal Stocks at Major Ports around Bohai Sea During Nov.7-13, 2011

Port	Coal Stocks (in 10,000 tonnes)	Up/Down (in 10,000 tonnes)	Growth%
Qinhuangdao port	582.3	-29.2	-4.77
Jingtang port	190	5	2.7
SDIC Caofeidian port	205	2	0.98
Tianjin port	217.8	-5.2	-2.33

Industry sources said that coal stocks at the four ports will edge up next week given the weakening demand from downstream sectors and correspondingly thermal coal prices will show slight rise.

sourced steelhome.cn/en

China Coal Price Rises as Qinhuangdao Stockpiles Plunge 25%

(Updates with port inventories in third paragraph.)

Oct.11 (Bloomberg) - Coal for generating power rose at China's Qinhuangdao port as inventories plunged to the lowest level in two years as utilities bought more before winter.

Coal with an energy value of 5,500 kilocalories per kilogram rose 0.6 percent to a range of 840 yuan ($132) to 850 yuan a metric ton yesterday, compared with two weeks earlier, according to data today from the China Coal Transport and Distribution Association. The association didn't publish data a week ago because of a national holiday.

Stockpiles at the port, which ships half of China's seaborne coal supplies, fell 25 percent to 4.41 million tons from two weeks earlier. That's the lowest level since inventories dropped to 4.06 million tons on Oct. 11, 2009.

Power plants in China typically start buying fuel from late September before peak heating demand during the colder months. This year, the biggest railway carrying coal from the northern mining province of Shanxi to Qinhuangdao started repairs on Sept. 21 for as long as 15 days, according to the Qinhuangdao Seaborne Coal Market industry website. The Daqin Railway repairs would cut daily capacity by 300,000 tons, the website said.

“Stockpiles fell as supplies reaching Qinhuangdao decreased because of the Daqin maintenance,” according to a report published on the association's website today. “Demand for coal also has risen as major power stations and heating companies started stockpiling coal early.”

Coal prices at Qinhuangdao are expected to remain steady in October as rising domestic demand is offset by increasing imports, the association said in the report.

China's coal imports rose to a record 17.5 million tons in July, according to customs data. Overseas purchases fell to 16.6 million tons in August, still 27 percent above the 13.1 million- ton monthly average from January to August.

(sourced BusinessWeek)

Coal inventories at European ports up

Sunday, 21 Aug 2011

Coal inventories at leading ports in Europe climbed to this year’s highest level as transportation costs rose.

According to Elias Chibani, a trader based in Amsterdam with the energy-trading unit of Vattenfall AB, the largest Nordic utility, stockpiles at Europees Massagoed-Overslagbedrijf BV or Emo, the largest coal terminal in Rotterdam, come to 3.14 million tonnes. They total 1.75 million tonnes at the OBA terminal at Amsterdam.

Chibani said that “That is the highest stocking level since the beginning of this year.” According to a report by Barclays Capital, end users prefer to keep coal at ports because of elevated transportation expenses caused by low water levels in the Rhine River.

Chibani said that “There are more sellers than buyers now, after the restocking by utilities in the past few weeks.”

(Sourced Bloomberg)

Coal inventory drops at six major Chinese power supply companies

August19,2011 | By steelorbis

Coal inventory has indicated a rapid decline at six major power supply companies in China, namely, Zhejiang Provincial Energy Group, Shanghai Electric Power Generation Group, Guangdong Yudean Jinghai Power Generation, China Guodian Group, China Huaneng Group, and China Datang Group. As of August 11, aggregate coal inventory at the companies in question showed a month-on-month decline of 1.31 million mt, falling to 11.23 million mt.

Meanwhile, the price of coal at the eastern Chinese port of Qinghuangdao has declined for six weeks in succession. As of August 12, at Qinghuangdao port the prices of Datong gifted mixed coal (6,000 kcal), Shanxi excellent mixed coal (5,500 kcal) and Shanxi common mixed coal (5,000 kcal) stood at RMB 875/mt ($137.15/mt), RMB 825/mt ($129.31/mt) and RMB 725/mt ($113.64/mt) respectively, down by RMB 5/mt ($0.78/mt), RMB 10/mt ($ 1.57/mt) and RMB 5/mt ($0.78/mt) as compared to last week's prices.

Fall in Indonesian Coal Exports in February'2011

Friday, 18 March 11

Indonesian coal exports seen a fall of 10.76% during Feb 2011. The world’s largest coal exporter shipped 22.029 MMts of coal against its exports of 24.687 million tons in January 2011, according to the industry sources.

The Indonesian coal exports to the largest importers viz., India and China have shrunk to the extent of 9.27% and 11.71% respectively in the month of Feb'2011. India has imported a total tonnage of around 4.631 MMts (5.105MMts in Jan) as against Chinese imports of 4.234 MMts (4.796 MMts in Jan).

India remained the largest importer of Indonesian coal in February 2011.

The combined affect of slow down in the imports of Indonesian coal had a combined affect of 4.19% of total Indonesian coal exports in February. However, India pushed China to second place in this year.

Last two years Chinese's utilities have imported more Indonesian coal than Indian Utilities. However, in 2011 India has inched above the Chinese utilities usage of Indonesian coal. In to 40.24 percent of total Indonesian coal exports in February goes to India and China.

Top five Indonesian coal importers in February were India, China, Japan South Korea and Taiwan.

According to market players, since 2009 Indonesian coal witnessed higher exports due to the increased demand from India and China. Chinese and Indian end-user are always keep an eye on Indonesia for their coal needs, due to the fact that Indonesia is closer to their ports. this results in lesser voyage time resulting in lesser sea freights.

Increase in Indonesian exports of Low rank coal picked up in recent months. This is one of the main reason for India emerging as the topper for Indonesian exports. due to domestic coal shortage Indian consumers have devised a primitive method of blending of Low rank high moisture coal with the available linkage domestic coal. Indian domestic coal characterized by high ash (30% to 40%) and low moisture (9%) which can advantageously blend with Indonesian Low rank coal of high Moisture (<50%) and low ash (<8%).

Also the increase of Bio Mass and Co-generation capacities Low rank coals have become the order of the day. Also the higher discount prevailing for Low rank coals have encouraged their usage.

Due to the spate of demand for Low ranking coal (<3200 GAR coals with Moisture of up to 50%) Sumatra based LRC suppliers were also targeting Indian market for their exports. In view of this encouraging business Industry is worried and closely watching the proposed Indonesian Govt. policy of banning exports of Low ranking coals.

One of the Indian traders commented that due to good rain resulting in continuous Hydro power, drop in cement and steel demand in India resulted in accumulation of stocks in Indian ports and with the plants. This is the main reason for lower imports in Indonesian coal. However, he also added that, the next 4 months being summer months in India the demand for power, steel and cement increases thereby the movement in coal may be witnessed resulting in higher consumption.

Indonesia already successfully implemented monthly coal reference price for its coal. Coal producers were asked to comply with the government declared index prior to conclude any short term and long terms coal sales agreement with its buyers.

Indonesia’s Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources has set the March 2011 Indonesian Coal Reference Price for thermal coal at US$ 122.43 per ton, which is 3.63 percent lesser than February 2011 price of US$ 127.05.

Instead of dropped in HBA, Indonesian coal prices were still stand at steady to firm position. small scale mines from Kalimantan were offering 6300 GAD coal between US$ 82 - 87 per MT and premium coal supplier's prices were already in three digits, an international trader said.

According to market stakeholders, the prices may stand stable due to Japan's earth quake, tsunami and nuclear power plants blast, but the prices and demand will move more stronger in coming months.

However, there is sort of confusion prevailing over the price movements as Japanese industries might declare FORCE Majure. The ongoing disturbance in major oil producing countries like Egypt, Libya and Bahrain needs to be taken into account before arriving at the conclusion.

Any time the industry may be attacked by wide fluctuations both sides.

(sourced:coalspot)

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QHD port rail coal supply rises last week

Mar 7, 2011

Coal transported via railway to Qinhuangdao port, China’s top loading port of the fuel, started rising in the week from Feb 28 to Mar 6, after declining for three consecutive weeks, according to a report published by Qinhuangdao Seaborne Coal Market.

During the week, coal haulage to the port was an increase of 6.55 percent compared to last week to 4.81 million tonnes, averaging 687,700 tonnes per day, said the report.

Data showed Qinhuangdao port handled a total of 4.51 million tonnes coal last week, and daily 644,000 tonnes coal was shipped, surging 20.4 percent from a week ago.

An average of 168 vessels waited off the port for loading each day, growing 7.7 percent from a week before, showed data.

Last week, coal inventory at the port, once the highest 8.48 million tonnes on Mar 1 since 2011, averaged 8.42 million tonnes per day. As of Mar 6, Qinhuangdao port had 8.39 million tonnes coal in stock.(sourced:en.sxcoal)