Home – Home – Jornals – Geography and Natural Resources 2023 number 2

This article examines the impact of the ban on the import of Russian coal by the European Union (EU) countries. The probable financial and volume losses of Russian coal are estimated according to data of the Federal Customs Service of Russia, International Energy Agency and JSC Russian Railways. Russia may short-deliver 49.35 million tons of coal to the EU (22 % of Russia’s coal exports in 2021), which is equivalent to $3.84 billion (20 % of coal exports). To the greatest extent, the ban on coal imports will affect Kemerovo oblast and the Republic of Khakassia (the EU accounts for about 30 % in the structure of supplies and 25-30 % in the structure of cash receipts). The import ban will practically not affect the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), Sakhalin oblast, Khabarovsk krai and Zabaikalsky krai. The biggest blow in reducing the volume of supplies to Europe will correspond to large holdings of Kemerovo oblast, Novosibirsk oblast and the Republic of Khakassia. It is established that in share terms, smaller companies will suffer more because EU countries occupied more than 50 % in the structure of their export supplies. There are three possible main scenarios for the development of interaction between the Russian and global coal markets: inertial (maintaining the share of European countries in the real supply structure by concluding agreements with Turkish traders), transformational (complete switching of supplies to new markets: the Asian giants China and India, the Middle East represented by Turkey, Southeast Asia or new African and American markets), as well as inertial-transformational (gradual replacement of the European market with Asian and new African and American ones).