Americas

Higher gas prices in the US are boosting the competitiveness of coal against gas in the country’s power sector and encouraging gas-to-coal switching. The Energy Information Administration (EIA) expects coal-fired generation to increase by 2.6% in Q1 2019, to an average of 3.2 TWh/d, compared with a year-on-year drop of 3.6% in Q1 2018.

However, gas-to-coal switching is expected to remain limited as coal has been losing ground in the US power mix in recent years. In particular, the production and mining capacity of US thermal...