“If, a year ago, fifteen months ago, you had said to people thermal coal could be $440, and coking coal could be $600, they’d call the ambulance and recommend a nice doctor,” Neil Bristow, managing director of H&W worldwide Consulting, said Thursday at a recent Coal Association of Canada conference.
“Who would believe it?”
While Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has roiled energy markets and driven up coal prices, the reality is that thermal coal prices had been surging months before the invasion, as Europe was already in a self-induced energy shortage and resorting back to coal power.
Five or six years ago, thermal coal sold for about $60 to $80 per tonne, Bristow said. Even before Russia invaded Ukraine, thermal coal prices had soared to around $200 per tonne.
“The fundamentals that caused those prices to increase in Q3 and Q4 of 2021 are still there, and they’ve only been exacerbated by the sanctions on Russian…
