Coal stocks at Ukrainian TPPs shrink by 4.5% within week

At the same time, anthracite reserves increased by 0.3%, from 784,000 tonnes to 786,000 tonnes, it said.

Meanwhile, gas grade coal stocks were down 7.9%, from 1.076 million tonnes to 991,000 tonnes.

Read alsoUkraine almost doubles spending on coal imports in 2017As UNIAN reported earlier, production of thermal and coking coal in Ukraine declined by 14.6% in 2017 against 2016, to 34.916 million tonnes, according to the Ukrainian Energy and Coal Industry Ministry.

UNIAN memo. Hostilities in the eastern regions of Ukraine have caused a significant shortage of coal, primarily that of thermal anthracite group produced in militant-controlled areas of Donetsk and Luhansk regions.

The energy companies began to transfer the thermal power plants' units from anthracite to gas coal feeding. However, there has been a shortage of the latter since the output of gas coal did not keep pace with its consumption growth. To solve the problem, the companies signed contracts for coal imports from South Africa and the United States.