Large coal reserves discovered

Source: Xinhua  |   2008-11-23  |     NEWSPAPER EDITION

A huge coalfield with 23 billion tons in reserve has been discovered in northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, according to the regional land resources department.

The coalfield, about 800 meters underground, stretches an area of more than 300 square kilometers in Shanshan County in the arid Turpan Basin.

The coal reserve, rich in low-sulfur steam coal, is close to the Lan-Xin Railway, the only railway connecting Xinjiang with the inland cities.

It is also 800 kilometers closer to China's inland than Xinjiang's largest Zhundong coalfield, thus able to cut transportation costs by 40 yuan (US$5.8) per ton.

Xinjiang, with estimated coal reserves of 1.82 trillion to 2.19 trillion tons, accounts for 40.5 percent of China's total coal reserves. With an annual production of 50 million tons, Xinjiang is the country's second largest coal producer after Shanxi Province in northern China.

China is also a big consumer of coal but a large amount of coal resources are lost due to inadequate planning, management and inferior technology.

China's 2007 Energy Blue Paper said that to produce one ton of coal in China, five to 20 tons of coal resources were consumed.