In the heart of Serbia, coal

To the west of the road that leads from Kosovska Mitrovica to Pristina, near the town of 20.000 inhabitants, which the Serbs call Obilić, and the Albanians Kastriot, at the place where the chimneys of the Kosovo thermal power plants rise above the plain, all the way to the rim of the hill on the horizon, stretches the territory below which they hide unusually large deposits of soft brown coal, lignite. But that is only one part of the Kosovo coal basin.

Here, almost on the outskirts of the capital of Kosovo, there are open pits Belaćevac and Dobro Selo, from which only a fiftieth of Kosovo's large lignite reserves have been mined in the last few decades, which, without any doubt, are large not only in Serbian but also in on a European scale.

When during the past summer, on the eve of the beginning of the customs war, which will turn into seventeen barricades as many as are currently erected in the north of Kosovo, in September, the Belgrade tabloids announced that there was interest in the West for Kosovo coal, the general mood on the subject was given by one of the commentators saying "Now everything is clear", trying to say what others have widely discussed - how Serbia lost Kosovo to "take away its coal".

But how much truth can there be in that? The very idea that the war in Kosovo was fought precisely because of lignite is not at all new, but these coal reserves are rarely thought about in Belgrade, except after such tabloid news, as an economic potential or any possible role. How important can lignite be in the negotiation process between Belgrade and Pristina? What kind of stake does he really represent and how important can he be in the Kosovo drama?

THIRD POOL IN EUROPE: The coal-bearing basin that lies beneath the southern Serbian province is undoubtedly the largest in the Balkans, but how big is it? The presence of these reserves has been known since the eighties of the last century, when studies on the mineral wealth of Kosovo were published. Since then, it's no secret that there are impressive lignite reserves at the bottom of the Kosovo-Metohija basin, which are estimated at around 15 billion tons.

Contemporary study "Mineral deposits of SerbiaThe Ministry of Energy and Mining of Serbia, which represents the base of all ore deposits in the country, lists in detail the reserves at Belaćevac, Dobro Selo and other unused deposits in Kosovo, talking about soft brown coal, lignite, deposited in the Pliocene, which is a geological epoch that lasted from 5,3 to 2,6 million years ago.

Similar estimates are also given in Pristina, where the Ministry of Energy and Mining announced five years ago that Kosovo has 14,7 billion tons of lignite, which is the third largest reserve in Europe, just behind Germany and Poland.

According to data from the Independent Commission for Mines and Minerals in Kosovo (ICMM), the amount of 14,7 billion actually represents the fifth largest confirmed coal reserves in the world. However, this should still be seen as a mild exaggeration, completely in the spirit of the former story of how we live in the richest country in the world.

The Kosovo basin cannot even be compared with the proven reserves of the USA, Russia, China and Australia, where, after all, higher-quality hard coal, not lignite, prevails. However, the Kosovo coal basin is undoubtedly important within the framework of the Western Balkans.

Kosovar lignite, in fact, constitutes as much as 76 percent of all coal reserves deposited under what, at least according to the Constitution, is considered the territory of Serbia. For the sake of comparison, in "Kolubara", where 30 million tons are mined annually, which is the largest production in Serbia that feeds the electric giants in all the blocks of the TENT A and B power plants near Obrenovac, there are reserves of four billion tons, which is enough to the mines here, current and future, will work at least until 2060. However, this represents only a quarter of the coal reserves found in Kosovo. In Kostolac there are deposits of about 1,5 billion, which is only a tenth of Kosovo's coal.

HUNTED PLEISTOCENE: This spring, the Ministry of Environment, Mining and Spatial Planning gave the media estimates that Serbia has coal for the entire lifetime of its thermal power plants, including the two that have yet to be built, "Kolubara" B and TENT B3. However, if at least part of the coal from Kosovo, possibly obtained through a favorable contract with the administration from Pristina, was included in the total balance, it would easily be possible to obtain another century for the entire Western Balkans.

Seen from the usage side, under the administrative territory of Kosovo, in any case, there is fuel hidden that could feed thermal power plants in the entire region for centuries. Shallow and easily accessible, and also present in large quantities, Kosovo lignite may in the not-so-distant future represent a key energy resource for the Balkans, so it's actually strange how until recently it attracted almost no, or at least not public, attention from local politicians.

The first two major thermal energy facilities in Serbia were built in Kosovo at one time - they are the thermal power plants "Kosovo" A and B, where many residents of the province found work, although it is mostly said that they were Serbs. Unfortunately, due to the destroyed energy sector, the potential of Kosovo's lignite is currently not being used by the population of Kosovo itself. It is more often seen as some kind of cursed legacy, deposited in the Pleistocene, which by chance found itself under our graves and theirs, and which only occasionally surfaces above the ground.

Of all the lignite in Kosovo, only two percent of the reserves have been used to date. On the other hand, Elektroprivreda Kosova (KEK), which after the UNMIK administration took over all the facilities of Elektroprivreda Serbia without compensation, in Kosovo's thermal power plants, which according to ICMM provide as much as 97 percent of the total electricity produced in Kosovo, burns nothing but this ore treasure.

During the last ten years, the international community has allegedly invested between five and ten billion dollars in Kosovo's electricity industry, but KEK, after literally the dark first decade of the 5,2st century, reached the production level of the XNUMXs. Thus, last year it produced only XNUMX kilowatt-hours, which represents only a quarter of only one, albeit imposing, Serbian power plant, TENT B.

LAND OF COAL: Coal, although a robust and environmentally superior source of energy, will be an important resource everywhere in the world for a long time, and especially in Serbia. After Fukushima and the low probability that the world will return to the nuclear path, the fate of fossil fuel use is not as uncertain as it seemed just a few years ago. Alternative sources, for their part, have too little capacity to be a real alternative to coal.

The general public is rarely aware of how crucial coal is for Serbia's economy and that, in essence, it represents the only real natural wealth that this landlocked Balkan country with technologically backward agriculture has at its disposal - coal mined in large quantities, converted into relatively cheap electricity, it subsidizes production and any economic growth in general. Serbia's electric energy capacities, although practically not renewed for almost three decades, are still the largest in the Western Balkans, and represent the only real comparative advantage of Serbia over its neighbors.

This view is not only local. That's how WikiLeaks, among other American confidential documents, published a cable from the American embassy in Belgrade that dealt exclusively with coal at the end of August. Namely, in January of this year, an analysis was sent to Washington on "Serbia's attachment to coal for the sake of energy and political needs".

The study primarily related to the Kolubara basin, its potential and economic importance, as well as the enormous, not so well known to the public, political influence that "Kolubara" has on the authorities in Belgrade. The dispatch also mentions the affairs surrounding "Kolubara", but it also makes an interesting assessment that Serbia is "deeply tied to the coal that feeds its energy needs".

In addition, the writer of the American report notes, among other things, how coal in Serbia "will remain the primary fuel in the next few decades due to the natural wealth and potential it represents", but also due to political circumstances. If, from the position of this attachment to coal, Serbia's "attachment" to Kosovo, which is an undoubted treasure trove of coal, is observed, it can even be concluded that coal is actually the heart of Serbia.

ENERGY VALUE: The total value of Kosovo's lignite reserves is estimated at between 300 and 500 billion dollars, depending on the type of estimate. Domestic experts usually use an estimate of around 500 billion, while recently in the "Wall Street Journal" an estimate of 300 million appeared. At one time, UNMIK also made an assessment which, it is unknown, showed a tenfold lower value.

However, regardless of the assessment, all sources agree that the Kosovo-Metohija basin is still dominated by low-quality coal - lignite, which actually makes up 97 percent of Serbia's coal reserves. As stated in the database "Mineral deposits of Serbia", "Kosovo coal is poorly consolidated lignite". Its energy value is about 8000 joules per kilogram, and it is a mixture that contains a significant proportion of water, about 15 percent of ash and about 1 percent of sulfur.

However, according to experts, there is enough lignite in Kosovo to compensate for its low efficiency, and it is apparently excellent for exploitation. Coal layers in the country have a relatively large thickness, from about 30 to 70 meters, and at the same time they are located at a small "depth" in relation to the ground surface. In addition, the ratio of coal to tailings is 1:1,8, which is not considered bad.

Finally, is there anything practical that could be worked out? Namely, once the mutual blockades and tensions over stamps and customs officials are over, Kosovo coal could become an important political issue in the negotiations between Belgrade and Pristina, and as things always stand with energy, it could perhaps also represent a terrain where there would be successful mutual cooperation between two seemingly irreconcilable peoples.

Let's say that there is some kind of exchange of Serbian experience with energy facilities with Kosovo lignite. One side, at least from a layman's point of view, claims the objects it has built, and the other claims the reserves that are under the territory it controls on the ground. It is hard to imagine that Europe would not like to resolve this situation to mutual satisfaction, which would create what the entire region needs - jobs. And come kilowatt-hours.

But for now, it's all about mutual suspicions. In a story published in July by the Belgrade tabloids, financial magnate and altruist George Soros, otherwise a favorite target of that type of press at every opportunity, agreed with the Kosovar billionaire from New York Sahit Muja regarding the exploitation of Kosovo coal.

Along with the Serbian tabloids, that story was also reported by the Russian media, and it clearly indicated the idea that the war in Kosovo was being waged in order for America to exploit the lignite there. Of course, the story found its believers, however, from the perspective of American coal reserves, otherwise the largest on the planet, it seems pointless to wage war in some Balkan over a small basin of low-quality coal that cannot be easily transported to the West, and at the same time , ten years after the war it stands completely unused.

In addition, of course, comes the completely crazy idea that where there is coal, there must also be oil, so all kinds of additional theories were born, which are still debated on the forums. A certain Russian academic, Yuri Anistratov, quoted in one of the news, even concludes that "the tragic fate of this Serbian province once again confirms the sad fact that in the modern world, natural resources are often a curse for the country that owns them."

The curse here, obviously, is present. The issue of coal, however, lies a little deeper than both Illyrian and Kosovar colors, so it may be a way to overcome the curse.

IMPOSING RESERVES: 15 billion tons of lignite in Kosovophoto: reuters