Lviv - State-run Lvivvuhillia's plans foresee a 25 percent rise in coal output in 2015, to 2 million tonnes, from 1.6 million tonnes, First Deputy Energy and Coal Industry Minister Yuriy Ziukov told reporters after his tour of Lviv region.
“If this year Lviv region is expected to produce 1.6 million tonnes, we see that next year it will be able to mine about 2 million tonnes. This will be an increase in the energy sector in general. We’ll work with every coal mine to help boost its efficiency,” he said.
There are also plans to boost coal output in a neighboring region, Volyn region, in particular due to the completion of Novovolynska coal mine No. 10, which requires about 500 million hryvnias, Ziukov said.
The deficit of power generating coal in Ukraine is about 1 million tonnes per month due to the Donbas crisis, he said. “Shipments of two brands of coal produced in Donbas – anthracite and lean coal – have been stalled. This is a very scarce type of coal. We’ve never bought it, only exported. This coal is available in Australia, Vietnam and there is some in Peru, but it has already been contracted for the next six months, and to get it, we need to offer a better price,” he said.
Ziukov also said that contracts to buy coal from the Republic of South Africa had already been concluded by Ukraine.
Talks are under way to resume coal supplies from Donbas where there is about 700,000 tonnes of coal stored in warehouses, he said. “Yet it’s very difficult to predict this issue: infrastructure is still in ruins. When the troops are withdrawn, the railways need to be rebuilt, and people need to be mobilized. There are a lot of issues there – both organizing and political ones,” he said.
Forty-seven state-run coal mines are in operation in Ukraine now, whereas other fifty-seven coal mines, located in the area occupied by pro-Russian separatists, are at a standstill with seven more fully destroyed.
