China: an overview

China's coal production exceeds 600,000,000 tons annually. Now entering a period of dramatic expansion, China promises to continue as one of the world's largest coal producers. While 96% of China's coal production is currently from underground mining, only 30% of this total output is from fully mechanized operations. Only one sixth - under 20% - of China's coal is currently processed in coal preparation plants. It is the stated obtective of the Chinese coal industry to significantly increase the percentage of operations using fully mechanized longwall retreat systems as well as to steadily increase the percent of coal that is cleaned through preparation plants in China. In 1978 alone, China purchased approximately 100 complete longwall systems from numerous Western manufacturers. It is obvious that the obcective is to test as many different Western mining systems as possible to enable the Chinese to collect sufficient data to choose the equipment in the future which will best help them reach their ambitious production goals. A significant move is underway to build and develop the needed coal preparation facilities to increase significantly the amount of coal cleaned. The immediate objective is to increase the amount of coal cleaned to 30% of total production.more » The estimated probable coal reserves in China total about 1,500,000,000,000 metric tons. Proven reserves are 600,000,000,000 tons.« less