Despite the fact that today alternative energy sources are being used more and more intensively, coal mining is an actual industry. One of the most important areas of application of this type of fuel is the operation of power plants. Coal deposits are located in various countries of the world, and 50 of them are active.
World coal deposits
The largest amount of coal is mined in the United States in deposits in Kentucky and Pennsylvania, in Illinois and Alabama, in Colorado, Wyoming and Texas. Hard and brown coal, as well as anthracites are mined here. The second place in the extraction of these minerals is occupied by Russia.
China ranks third in coal production. The largest Chinese deposits are located in the Shanxing coal basin, in the Great Plain of China, Datong, Yangtze, etc. A lot of coal is also mined in Australia in the states of Queensland and New South Wales, near the city of Newcastle. India is a major coal producer, and the deposits are located in the northeast of the country.
Hard and brown coal has been mined in the Saar and Saxony, Rhine-Westphalia and Brandenburg deposits in Germany for more than 150 years. There are three coal basins in Ukraine: Dnieper, Donetsk, Lvov-Volyn. Anthracites, gas coal and coking coal are mined here. Sufficiently large-scale coal deposits are located in Canada and Uzbekistan, Colombia and Turkey, North Korea and Thailand, Kazakhstan and Poland, the Czech Republic and South Africa.
Coal deposits in Eurasia
A third of the world’s coal reserves are located in Eurasia. The largest number of deposits is located in the eastern part of the country, in Siberia. The largest Russian coal deposits are as follows:
Coal mining is a very promising sector of the economy today. Experts say that humanity consumes coal too intensively, so there is a threat that the world’s reserves may soon be used up, but in some countries there are significant reserves of this mineral. Its consumption depends on the application, and if you reduce the consumption of coal, it will last for a longer time.
