According to the United States Energy Information Administration (EIA), US coal exports rose by 61% to 97 million short tons (MMst) in 2017. Coal exports to Asia more than doubled from 15.7 MMst in 2016 to 32.8 MMst in 2017, even though Europe remained the top market recipient for US coal.
Most of the exported coal was steam coal (used for power generation purposes) and went to India (7.6 MMst, i.e. nearly three times as much as in 2016), South Korea (5.9 MMst in 2017, a 4.5-fold increase from 1.3 MMst in 2016) and Japan (2.7 MMst in 2017, another 4.5-fold increase from 0.6 MMst in 2016). The United States benefited from supply disruptions in Australia and Indonesia, the main source of coal for Asian customers.
The main driver behind the surge in South Korea is the government's policy to shift away from from nuclear power, thus increasing its reliance on power generation from coal-fired power plants. As for India, the coal-fired power capacity has doubled in the recent years and new supercritical coal-fired power plants require coal with higher quality and energy content than domestic coal, raising coal imports.