Clean coal
Trends in coal beneficiation
![Flow chart of a wet beneficiation plant for power station coal [1]](https://www.at-minerals.com/imgs/101291686_da2d82cc74.jpg)
Summary: The absolute demand for coal in order to meet energy requirements is going to rise rapidly all around the world and particularly in China and India. The last seven years have already seen an above-average increase in coal mining output of 5.4 % annually. The increase in consumption of coal has been accompanied by a rapid rise in CO2 emissions. Improved beneficiation of the coal could reduce greenhouse gases by up to 5 % as a result of the consequent increase in power station efficiency. This report provides a detailed review of coal industry developments as well as an overview of the coal beneficiation process. Country-specific differences and requirements will be particularly highlighted and related technological trends will be described. In conclusion, the report presents an overview of technology companies and discusses market prospects.
1 Development of the coal industry
In the primary energy consumption statistics, the worldwide consumption of coal has increased since 2002 at an average annual rate of 5.4 %, compared to 3.1 % for hydroelectricity and 3.0 % for natural gas. The average rate of increase of petroleum was 1.4 %, while that of nuclear power was 0.2 %. Fig. 1 depicts the absolute growth in primary energy requirement since 2002. This shows that the consumption of coal has increased by 37 %, natural gas by 19 % and oil by 9 %. As shown by Fig. 2, coal currently has a share of 33 % of
the world‘s fossil fuel...
