Editing Coal (section)

===Market trends===
{{See also|List of countries by coal production}}
[[File:Coal production by region, OWID.svg|thumb|upright=1.8|Coal production by region]]

In 2022, China used 4520 Mt of coal, comprising more than half of global coal consumption. India, the European Union, and the United States,  were the next largest consumers of coal, using 1162, 461, and 455 Mt respectively.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web |date=2023-12-15 |title=Coal 2023 – Analysis |url=https://www.iea.org/reports/coal-2023 |access-date=2024-10-28 |website=IEA |language=en-GB}}</ref>{{Rp|page=114}}  Over the past decade, China has almost always accounted for the lion's share of the global growth in coal demand.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Consumption – Coal Information: Overview – Analysis |url=https://www.iea.org/reports/coal-information-overview/consumption |access-date=2024-10-28 |website=IEA |language=en-GB}}Text was copied from this source, which is available under a [[creativecommons:by/4.0/|Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License]]</ref> Therefore, international market trends depend on [[Energy policy of China|Chinese energy policy]].<ref name="IEA2018">{{cite web |date=2018 |title=Coal 2018:Executive Summary |url=https://webstore.iea.org/download/summary/2415 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181218193720/https://webstore.iea.org/download/summary/2415 |archive-date=18 December 2018 |access-date=18 December 2018 |publisher=[[International Energy Agency]]}}</ref> 

Although the government effort to reduce [[air pollution]] in China means that the global long-term trend is to burn less coal, the short and medium term trends may differ, in part due to Chinese financing of new coal-fired power plants in other countries.<ref name="Cornot-Gandolfe 2018" />

Preliminary analysis by [[International Energy Agency]] (IEA) indicates that global coal exports reached an all-time high in 2023. Through to 2026, the IEA expects global coal trade to decline by about 12%, driven by growing domestic production in coal-intensive economies such as China and India and [[coal phase-out]] plans elsewhere, such as in Europe.<ref name=":1" /> While thermal coal exports are expected to decline by about 16% by 2026, exports of metallurgical coal are expected to slightly increase by almost 2%.<ref name=":1" />