Govt doubtful on coal processing obligation

While the government has obliged mineral miners to process and refine ores at home, it seems doubtful about imposing similar obligation to the coal miners given various obstacles such as availability of technology and market aspect for the products.

Director General of Coal and Mineral R. Sukhyar was quoted by Kontan daily as saying that the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources has submitted the draft of the revised Government Regulation No 23/2010 on domestic processing of coal to the Office of the Coordinating Minister for the Economy for final approval.

He said that in the draft of the revised regulation, the government does not impose any sanction, but detailing various forms of coal processing to generate greater value from the commodity such as via upgrading or coal liquefaction, suggesting that coal miners would not be obliged to implement domestic processing.

But miners have said that to date there is no commercially proven coal upgrading technology yet, and that current practice of coal washing and crushing are already enough to generate added value. (*)