Electricity and coal prices will run smoothly this winter

This winter, the pressure on heating and supply is not great. It is expected that the coal transportation in the Bohai Sea port will maintain stable operation, and the coastal coal transportation will not be warm or hot. The downstream power plants will be well stocked and the market coal price will stabilize. First of all, coal production remains high. The release of upstream advanced production capacity was accelerated, and the coal production and export volume in the "three West" region continued to maintain a growth trend. From January to October this year, the coal production above Designated Size in China was 3063.09 million tons, a year-on-year growth of 4.5%, and it is estimated that the new coal production in the year will exceed 100 million tons. Meanwhile, from January to October, China imported 276.24 million tons of coal, an increase of 24.2 million tons year on year. The sufficient supply and the increase of purchasing channels are in sharp contrast to the weak demand, which promotes the continuous accumulation of downstream inventory and the passive withdrawal of power plants. Up to now, the coal storage capacity of national key power plants has been maintained at over 95 million tons, while the total coal storage capacity of coastal power plants is 16.5 million tons; even if the main power plants do not pull coal, the coal storage capacity can be used for half a month. Second, the transportation bottleneck has been broken.
In addition to February, from January to September, the monthly shipment volume of coal railway in China is close to or more than 200 million tons. From January to September, China's railways shipped 1.82 billion tons of coal, a year-on-year increase of 2.8%; while the coal transportation capacity of ports around the Bohai Sea in China is also improving, Qinhuangdao port and Huanghua Port continue to consolidate the status of the main coal transportation port, with an annual throughput of 200 million tons; when the new Huadian coal terminal is put into operation, the overall loading capacity of Caofeidian port is improved rapidly, and the transportation efficiency is accelerated. In addition, the Haoji line has been put into operation, and the coal supply in the middle and upper reaches of the Yangtze River is also increasing. Again, the influence of UHP still exists. Although the hydropower operation is weakened, the UHV power supply is still increasing, and the pressure of coastal power plants is reduced; in addition, in the early winter, the weather in South China is not cold, and the load of six coastal power plants has not reached a high level. Near the coal ordering meeting, the wait-and-see atmosphere has risen again, the enthusiasm for downstream procurement is not high, and the release of new pallets is rare. In the coming December, it is expected that the daily consumption of coastal power plants will increase to about 700000 tons. However, with the high inventory of power plants and the accelerated production of upstream power plants, and the accelerated shipment of Railways and ports, the amount of coal purchased from the downstream ports around Bohai Sea will be limited and it is difficult to drive the market to improve immediately. The fourth is to limit the discount of imported coal. In the near future, many southern ports have indicated that they will restrict the import of coal before the end of the year, and some ports even take "one size fits all" (no ship unloading, no customs clearance) strong restrictive measures, which will have a certain impact on the import of coal. However, power generation enterprises in some coastal areas are still bidding for the imported power coal in December, especially the power plants under the five major power generation groups are not affected much, and they are still actively importing power coal. It is estimated that in November, China's imported coal is still expected to reach 18-20 million tons, higher than the same period last year.
2026-10-15
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