Coal in Ukraine

Like other Soviet enterprises, coal companies provided social facilities including schools and hospitals.

[3][4] In 2013, according to the Ukrainian mining trade union, coal constituted 95% of Ukraine's domestic energy resources.

[5] It has been calculated that 90 percent of Ukraine's coal reserves are located in the Donets Coalfield in the east of the country.

[3] In March 2017, the Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko signed a decree that banned the movement of goods to and from territories controlled by the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic and Luhansk People's Republic, which stopped coal from the Donets Black Coal Basin being used in the rest of the country.

[15] The war in Donbass caused coal production in Ukraine to decrease by 22.4% of its 2013 value, to 64.976 million tonnes.

[3] However local coal only provides 50% of the country’s electricity needs, therefore requiring Ukraine to import from Russia and Poland.

[3] As of 2013, the Ukrainian government plans to completely replace the natural gas used in the steel industry and some other economic sectors with coal.

In 2019, Ukraine produced the highest amount of PM10 particulates and sulfur dioxide air pollution emissions in Europe from coal fired electricity generation.

[4] The coal mines of Donbas are one of the most hazardous in the world due to enormous working depths (down from 300 to 1200 m) as a result of natural depletion, as well as due to high levels of methane explosion, coal dust explosion and rock burst dangers.

All these problems together with other challenges have resulted in "gradually declining production capacity and a loss of global market share".