Coal’s four-year lows hide a coming global supply squeeze
Languishing global prices today mask a very different future for the world’s most-consumed source of power. Australian thermal coal contracts, the benchmark for Asia, are hovering close to $100 a ton thanks to a mild winter and global oversupply, a price level last seen in May 2021, before the energy-market upheaval that followed Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. While that is battering producers and will cheer those predicting the end of the dirtiest fossil fuel, it’s a trough that may not last.
Languishing global prices today mask a very different future for the world’s most-consumed source of power.
Australian thermal coal contracts, the benchmark for Asia, are hovering close to $100 a ton thanks to a mild winter and global oversupply, a price level last seen in May 2021, before the energy-market upheaval that followed Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. While that is battering producers and will cheer those predicting the end of the dirtiest fossil fuel, it’s a trough that may not last.
