Skip to main content
U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Canada prepares for the coming coal boom

Journal Article · · World Coal; (United States)
OSTI ID:6686422

In a significant action, a federal-provincial agreement has provided for the expansion of coal terminal capacity at Vancouver. A policy paper noted that while coal currently provided only 9 percent of Canada's domestic primary energy supply, projections indicated that this figure could increase to between 12 and 18 percent by the year 2000. Canadian thermal coal consumption was forecast to grow from 29,000,000 tons in 1980 to between 44,000,000 and 59,000,000 tons in 1990 and to between 70,000,000 and 85,000,000 tons by the year 2000. Production of coking coal for export was also forecast to increase. Production of clean coal grew 8 percent in 1979 to 33,000,000 tons, up from some 30,500,000 tons in 1978. Imports, which had been in balance with exports in 1978, increased by 24 percent to approximately 17,500,000 tons as consumers built up stocks that were depleted during the 1978 labor strikes in the United States coal industry. All of Canada's imports come from the United States, moving by rail from West Virginia and Pennsylvania to Lake Erie. The coal is then transferred to lake freighters for the trip to consumers in Ontario and Quebec. The long distances separating Canadian coal producing areas from the major coking and steam coal consumers in Ontario have, until recently, prevented large scale inter-provincial coal movement. Canadian exports were once again dominated by Japanese markets as 75 percent of all exports consisted of coking sales to Japanese steel mills. Japan received some 10,500,000 tons of the 13,700,000 tons of coal exported from Canada in 1979.

Research Organization:
Dept. of Energy, Mines, and Resources, Ottawa, Ontario
OSTI ID:
6686422
Journal Information:
World Coal; (United States), Journal Name: World Coal; (United States) Vol. 6:11; ISSN WOCOD
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English