Over the past few days, many places continue to high temperatures, to meet the summer into a critical stage. Coal enterprises as energy supply “ballast” is running full steam to ensure supply. With China's coal resources development center of gravity further west, how to stabilize production and supply at the same time, enhance the transformation of vitality, to create new momentum for development? In this regard, the reporter went into a number of coal enterprises to start interviews.

Industry concentration enhancement

Zahanaoer open-pit coal mine in Inner Mongolia, a full set of coal transmission system running at full capacity, about 45,000 tons of coal loaded and sent to the power plant every day since summer; in Gansu Huadian Coal, 7 automated integrated mechanical coal mining face at full power, an average of every 7 minutes there will be a coal trucks from here; NaoMaoHu mines in Xinjiang, the train driving in the energy artery transportation channel, “Xinjiang coal outbound transportation”, “Xinjiang coal outbound transportation”. “Xinjiang coal transportation” ushered in the peak season.

In recent years, the layout of the coal industry development to open the depth of adjustment, production centers gradually to the resource endowment, strong competitiveness of the region and enterprise concentration, the industrial layout continues to shift to the west. Data show that in 2023, China's raw coal production of more than 100 million tons of provinces, a total of seven, of which, Shanxi, Shaanxi, Inner Mongolia, Xinjiang, four provinces of raw coal production accounted for 81.3% of the country; Xinjiang raw coal production of about 457 million tons, an increase of nearly 200 million tons compared with 2020, the “Xinjiang coal outbound transportation” exceeded 100 million tons, has become a new growth pole of national coal supply. It has become a new growth pole of national coal supply.

According to “2023 Annual Report on Coal Industry Development”, as of the end of last year, the number of coal mines nationwide was reduced to about 4,300, and large coal mines with annual production capacity of 1.2 million tons and above accounted for more than 85% of the country's output, an increase of 5 percentage points compared with 2020; 81 coal mines with annual production capacity of 10 million tons have been built, with an annual approved production capacity of 1.33 billion tons; 24 coal mines with 10 million tons of production are under construction, with an annual designed production capacity of 310 million tons; the annual production capacity of 10 million tons has reached 1.3 billion tons. 310 million tons per year; the proportion of small coal mines with an annual production capacity of 300,000 tons or less in the country will drop to less than 1%.

The leading ability of large coal enterprises has been significantly enhanced. The deepening and upgrading action of reforming state-owned enterprises has been steadily promoted, and new breakthroughs have been made in strategic restructuring and specialized integration. 17 enterprises have a raw coal output of over 50 million tons, with a total raw coal output of about 2.69 billion tons, accounting for 57.1% of the country; 8 enterprises have a raw coal output of over 100 million tons, with a total raw coal output of 2.14 billion tons, accounting for 45.4% of the country.

“Originally, more than 10,000 coal mines produced more than 3 billion tons of coal a year, but now more than 4,000 coal mines can produce more than 4 billion tons of coal.” Zhang Hong, secretary of the Discipline Inspection Committee and spokesman of the China Coal Industry Association, told reporters that as a traditional energy industry, improving industrial concentration and optimizing the layout of production capacity is an important part of the transformation and development of the coal industry and the establishment of a modern industrial system. By deeply promoting the supply-side structural reform of the coal industry, eliminating backward production capacity, and changing the distribution pattern of multiple, scattered and small, the concentration of the coal industry has increased significantly, and modernized large-scale mines have become the main force of the industry.

Concentration on transformation and upgrading

With the gradual westward shift of the industrial production center, resource endowment and volume scale does not account for the advantages of the coal enterprises how to deal with the transformation of change?

Come to Sichuan Coal Industry Group, the first thing to look at is not the coal mine, but machinery and equipment factory. Into the production workshop of Sichuan Jiahua Machinery Co., Ltd. for sharp inclination, large inclination angle coal seam mining intelligent integrated coal mining equipment neatly arranged. This is a national specialization, speciality and new “small giants” enterprises, but also is currently the only domestic design and production of ZJ series of sharp inclined hydraulic support equipment manufacturers.

Sichuan and Chongqing region, thin coal seams, mining difficulty, coal beds and the ground inclination angle of up to 78 degrees, compared with large mines in the west, in terms of production and operation does not occupy an advantage. Previously, in order to enhance the regional energy supply capacity, to overcome the large inclination, sharp inclination integrated mining was once in front of the technicians of the primary problem.

“The technical innovation that was once forced out has now become a brand new track for transformation and development.” Sichuan Coal Industry Group party secretary and chairman Wang Changrun told reporters that after sustained research, technicians took the lead in overcoming the large inclination, sharp inclination integrated mining this international problem, and successfully developed a series of hydraulic support equipment.

Wang Changrun frankly admitted that, despite the Sichuan Coal Group in the resource endowment of inherent shortcomings, but in the context of the transformation and development, technological innovation has brought new opportunities for enterprise development, high-end equipment manufacturing has become the extension of the industrial chain, expanding the value chain of the new track. At present, in the world's existing coal reserves, large inclination, sharp inclination of coal beds accounted for nearly 35%, has a huge mining prospects, equipment market demand is broad, Sichuan Coal Group series of mining equipment development also provides the corresponding technical solutions for the world.

According to reports, in August 2005, in order to optimize and adjust the structure of the coal industry, Sichuan Province, the start of the merger and reorganization of coal state-owned enterprises, Panzhihua, Guangneng, Dazhu, Guangwang, Furong 5 Mining Bureau and Weiyuan Coal Mine, South Sichuan Coal as the basis for the formation of the establishment of the Sichuan Provincial Coal Industry Group. The newly formed Sichuan Coal Group takes “transformation and upgrading of traditional energy, forward-looking layout of emerging industries, scale development of equipment manufacturing, and integrated development of medical care and recreation” as the main focus, and gradually builds up a system of linked and integrated development of industries supported by non-coal minerals, modern construction, new energy, machinery manufacturing, and medical care and recreation in addition to the production and operation of coal.

Liang Jiakun, president of China Coal Industry Association, said that entering the new development stage, the coal industry should attach great importance to the optimization of industrial layout, succession of coal resources, transformation and development of the old mining areas and other practical problems, break through the constraints of coal mining conditions, give full play to the advantages of the industry chain synergy, promote the realization of the industrial structure change, the transformation of the development of the kinetic energy and the transformation of corporate governance, and to provide a strong energy security and economic and social development for the protection of the national energy security and economic and social development. Guarantee.

Promoting Greening and Intelligentization

A 5G converged communication network, so that the positioning of workers in underground mines is clearly visible, in the underground downtrack centralized control cabin can remotely control the coal mining machine - in the Zhang Shuanglou Coal Mine of Xu Mining Group, intelligent equipment has been integrated into the whole field of coal mining and supervision, the whole process, and realize the “coal mining not see coal! The coal mining is not seen.” As the first batch of national intelligent demonstration coal mine, Zhang Shuanglou coal mine has completed the construction of intelligent coal mining, intelligent tunneling, intelligent auxiliary transport and other projects, from the “scale of production” to “quality and efficiency” change.

A small piece of coal, under the action of water and a small amount of additives, through the nanosized process, transformed into the smallest particle size of 50 nanometers, with the characteristics of hydrogen storage and empowerment of coal-based nano-hydrocarbon fuel. In the field of thermal power generation, this fuel can significantly reduce coal consumption and carbon dioxide emissions. In the circular economy industry incubation base of Guoneng Junneng Group, there is a new path for the clean utilization of coal.

With the continuous promotion of greening and intelligence, the coal industry is gradually bidding farewell to its past image of “stupid, big, black and thick”, and reshaping its new advantages around the construction of a modernized industrial system.

Li Fulong, director of the Development Planning Department of the National Energy Board, said that coal, as the main source of energy in China, is both an important fuel and an important industrial raw material. The coal industry coordinates development and safety, reasonably increases advanced production capacity, strengthens the clean and efficient use of coal, and takes solid steps towards high-quality development.

Green and intelligent development has been effective. On the one hand, green development technology has been widely applied, and the ecological environment of mines has been significantly improved; over the past 10 years, the comprehensive utilization rate of mine water and the rate of land reclamation have both increased by more than 10 percentage points. On the other hand, intelligent construction has entered a new stage of accelerated development and deeper advancement. As of the end of May, the country has built a total of 1993 intelligent coal mining face, intelligent digging face 2232, reducing the number of people to increase safety and efficiency is effective, the key coal mining enterprises intelligent coal mining face single-shift operating personnel to reduce the number of people more than 6, labor efficiency increased by more than 20%, the mode of coal production to achieve a major transformation.

The level of clean and efficient utilization continues to improve. By the end of last year, more than 95% of China's coal power units had realized ultra-low emissions, and the world's largest clean coal power supply system had been built. At the same time, we have vigorously promoted the construction of coal washing capacity and continued to improve the quality evaluation and management standards for commodity coal, and the quality of coal has been steadily improved.

The development and utilization of coalbed methane, or coal mine gas, has achieved leapfrog development. The coal industry continues to promote the comprehensive management of coal mine gas, coal bed methane industry to achieve large-scale development, has built the Qinshui Basin, the eastern edge of the Ordos Basin, two major industrial bases. 2023 national coal bed methane production of 11.77 billion cubic meters, an increase of nearly three times compared with 10 years ago, becoming a powerful supplement to the supply of natural gas, the economy, society, ecology and other comprehensive benefits are further apparent.

“The key to building a modernized coal industry system is to deepen the integration and development of the new generation of smart and green technologies with the traditional coal industry, and to promote the transformation and upgrading of the industry with intelligent changes.” Liang Jiakun said that it is necessary to build a new engine of coal economic growth based on building the integration, clustering and ecological development of the coal industry with high-end manufacturing, new energy, new materials, modern service industry, digital economy, etc., and improve the security and competitiveness of the industrial chain supply chain.

Article Source：Economic Daily