The development strategy of the coal industry of Russia, largely oriented to China, will inevitably fail due to a new global environmental agenda. Such a development of events within the framework of the Eastern Economic Forum (WEF) was predicted by the Special Representative of the President of Russia for Relations with International Organizations to achieve the goals of sustainable development Anatoly Chubais, RBC reports.
According to him, the basis of the document adopted last year is an increase in fuel exports to the Asia-Pacific region. The authors of the strategy referred to the construction of new coal stations in China. In their opinion, an increase in demand is inevitable, and Russian companies must use these circumstances.
In the conservative scenario, by 2035, it is planned to increase production from the current 402.1 million tons to 485 million, and on an optimistic one – up to 688 million tons. Export forecast is from 259 million tons to 392 million.
However, Chubais recalled that the head of the PRC Si Jinspin in April of this year announced the tightening of control over the consumption of coal in the country. Speaking at the Global Climate Summit, he promised that since 2025 the PRC will begin to reduce the consumption of the fuel harmful from an ecological point of view. As a result, the demand for coal will inevitably fall.
In the new conditions, the president’s special representative, the adopted strategy is inoperable, following it is comparable to the movement at all speed towards the concrete wall. Instead, as Chubais emphasized, it should adequately respond to the global climate agenda that the largest planet economies are supported.
In this way, the official commented on the words of the head of the Siberian coal energy company Stepan Solzhenitsyn. The latter urged to do not climate and decarbonization, and clean air and the struggle with household waste, because these issues are more relevant for Russia.
Earlier, Russian President Vladimir Putin acknowledged that delays in the development of railway infrastructure in the Far East led to the fact that now Russia cannot fully use favorable conjuncture on the global coal market.