SE Asian countries seen importing more coal

Despite the push in renewable energy development, Southeast Asian countries are expected to continue increasing their coal imports amid coal power plant investments in the region.

In last week’s Philippines Commodity Market Insights forum, S&P Global Platts said the burgeoning coal demand in the Southeast Asian region has captured investors’ attention with huge growth potential.

The region imported 115 million metric tons (MT) of coal last year, which is expected to further increase to 128 million MT this year, S&P Global Platts Asia thermal coal editor Fred Wang said in his presentation.

This as Southeast Asian region countries still work on long term contracts, as well as spot purchases, he said.

“Southeast Asia is looking to import 128 million MT this year on the back of power investments in the region,” Wang said.

In particular, the Philippines is seen to import 27 million MT tons of coal this year, with Indonesia remaining as its predominant supplier, Wang said.

The figure was slightly higher than last year’s import of 26.98 million MT, based on data from the Department of Energy (DOE).

“The Philippine coal demand is expected to rise due to more power plants being built,” Wang said.

S&P Global Platts said the Philippines has been a net importer of coal since 2005 as coal corners a significant chunk in the energy mix.

The Luzon grid has the largest power demand at 74 percent of the total.

DOE data showed the Philippines continued to rely heavily on coal imports as it has consumed more imported coal than it produced last year.

Government data showed the country used 33.12 million metric tons (MT) of coal last year. Of the total consumption, 26.98 million MT were from imports, while 5.03 million MT were from local production.

In terms of usage, the power sector was the biggest coal user with 28.65 million metric tons, followed by the cement industry with 2.75 million MT.

The country also produced 15.27 million MT of coal – majority of which came from the coal mines of Semirara Mining and Power Corp.

Indonesia was the country’s largest source of coal imports at 90.2 percent or 24.98 million MT, and these were mostly used in the power sector.

While coal production reached 15.27 million MT, 10.24 million MT were exported to other countries, while the rest were consumed locally.