South Korea’s coal briquette consumption is likely to drop below 500,000 tons for the first time this year on lower demand and higher coal prices.

According to the Korea Mine Rehabilitation and Mineral Resources Corp. on Sunday, domestic coal briquette consumption fell to 508,000 tons last year, a 21 percent drop on-year.

The consumption of coal briquettes has been continuously falling since 2014.

The number dropped from 1.9 million tons in 2013 to 1.6 million tons in 2014.

The biggest drop was observed in 2019 when the number dropped by 29.4 percent on-year, from 913,000 tons to 644,000 tons.

This was due to the government increasing the price of coal briquettes by 19.6 percent to 639 won ($0.54) in 2018.

The government had jacked up prices of coal briquettes sharply since 2016 in an effort to meet rising production costs and to reduce consumption of fossil fuels.

The government’s effort to replace coal briquettes with other fuel for domestic heating also contributed to the drop of coal briquette consumption.

Hong Yoo기자@heraldcorp.com