Page 147 - Synthetic Fuels Handbook

FUELS FROM COAL 133

Europe
North America
Asia
Australia
Africa
South America

FIGURE 5.3 Global distribution of recoverable coal reserves.

(32.7 percent) (Fig. 5.3) there being a slight difference in the data when compared to global
distraction of total coal resources (Fig. 5.2) (BP, 2007). Whichever way the data are consid-
ered, the amount of coal in the world is phenomenal.
However, for Europe the coal currently extracted within the EU (European Union) can-
not meet the demand in the long-term, which is not even possible at present levels. The
only European countries with important hard coal resources for economic extraction are
Poland and the Czech Republic, but also those will be depleted before the end of this cen-
tury at current production. Germany has only resources of subbituminous coal and lignite,
which will likely be depleted in about 30 years at current rate of consumption (Spohn and
Ellersdorfer, 2005).
Hard coal with a calorific value greater than 16,500 kJ/kg (>4.000 kcal/kg) is traded
globally. The price is usually not significantly affected by transport costs. Soft brown coal
with a calorific value less than 16,500 kJ/kg is mainly used locally by power plants near the
coal deposits. Coal remains the most important fuel, now amounting to about 55 percent of
the reserves of all nonrenewable fuels (Fig. 5.4), followed by oil with 26 percent (conven-
tional oil 18.1 percent and nonconventional oil 7.4 percent) and natural gas with almost
15 percent, nuclear fuels account for about 4 percent (BGR, 2007).

Coal
Hydroelectric
Natural gas
Nuclear
Petroleum

FIGURE 5.4 Coal as member of the energy-generating
group.

The United States has the largest hard coal reserves (26 percent of global reserves),
followed by Russia (12 percent), China (11 percent), India (10 percent), and Australia
(9 percent). Soft brown coal reserves are 10 percent of global reserves. Australia
has the largest soft brown coal reserves (19.2 percent of global reserves), followed
by India (16.9 percent), the United States (16.1 percent), China (9.0 percent), Serbia and
Montenegro (7.7 percent), Russia (5.0 percent), and Germany (3.2 percent) (BGR, 2007).