Coal Price History: Monthly Australian Thermal Coal Since 1992

Coal remains the single largest source of electricity generation worldwide and a major input to steelmaking. This dataset reproduces the World Bank Pink Sheet price of Australian thermal coal shipped FOB from Newcastle, in US dollars per metric ton, as monthly averages since January 1992. It is a 6,000 kcal/kg futures price from February 2022, after spot prices for 6,000 kcal/kg coal from 2015 and higher-energy grades before. Australia and Indonesia dominate exports; China and India are the largest consumers.

Dataset: Coal Price (1992–2026) · Updated 2026-09-01

Data provided as is, with no warranty of accuracy or timeliness. Check any figure against the primary source cited on this page before using it. Terms: legal notice.

Source: World Bank, Commodity Price Data (The Pink Sheet) · CC BY 4.0

Macro Takeaway

Dataset Overview

Dataset Variables

The CSV and Excel files contain the following columns. Each row represents one calendar month.

Column names match the CSV headers exactly.

Download the Complete Dataset

The full dataset is available in CSV and Excel formats — monthly observations covering more than three decades.

Data provided as is, with no warranty of accuracy or timeliness. Check any figure against the primary source cited on this page before using it. Terms: legal notice.

Source Data Access: World Bank Pink Sheet

The underlying series is the “Coal, Australian” column of the Monthly Prices sheet in the World Bank’s Commodity Price Data, known as the Pink Sheet. The World Bank publishes it as a monthly Excel workbook on its commodity markets page, under a CC BY 4.0 licence that requires attribution to the World Bank.

The Eco3min dataset reproduces that column unmodified from January 1992, in US dollars per metric ton, in a stable CSV with a fixed column name for direct use in Python, R or any data pipeline. The URL never changes, which makes it suitable for automated scripts.

Direct CSV Access — Eco3min Structured Dataset

https://eco3min.fr/dataset/coal-price.csv

This URL returns the complete dataset in CSV format. It can be used directly in pandas, R, curl, or any data tool.

Using the Dataset in Python

import pandas as pd

url = "https://eco3min.fr/dataset/coal-price.csv"
df = pd.read_csv(url, parse_dates=["date"])

print(df.head())
print(df["coal_price"].describe())

df.plot(x="date", y="coal_price", title="Coal Price", legend=False)

Using the Dataset in R

library(readr)

url <- "https://eco3min.fr/dataset/coal-price.csv"
df <- read_csv(url)

head(df)
summary(df$coal_price)

Both examples load the dataset directly from the URL — no download or API key required.

Methodology

The World Bank reports the Australian coal price in US dollars per metric ton, for thermal coal shipped FOB from Newcastle. Since February 2022 it is the 6,000 kcal/kg futures price, and from 2015 to January 2022 the 6,000 kcal/kg spot price. From 2002 to 2014 it refers to 6,300 kcal/kg coal (GAR, FOB piers Newcastle/Port Kembla), and before 2002 to 6,667 kcal/kg coal.

Values are monthly averages, which smooth the intra-month swings visible in daily futures and physical quotes. The series begins in 1992.

An Eco3min pipeline on GitHub Actions reads the Pink Sheet workbook after each monthly release, keeps the column unmodified and regenerates the CSV, Excel and JSON files and the page metadata. The World Bank updates the Pink Sheet on the second business day of each month.

Data Quality & Provider Notes

The Pink Sheet price is a widely cited reference for the physical market. A few provider-specific points matter when using this series.

• Release latency. The World Bank publishes the Pink Sheet on the second business day of each month, with the average of the month just ended. Eco3min refreshes the file after each release. The series is not a real-time price.
• Monthly average vs futures spot. This series is a monthly average. It will differ from any single exchange settlement, and a monthly average necessarily understates intra-month peaks.
• Revisions. Prices are market-derived and are not revised like survey-based macro series, but the World Bank can correct recent months or replace a series, and it lists those changes in the notes of the Pink Sheet workbook.
• Source change on 30 September 2026. Until that date this file reproduced another publisher’s series; the whole history was then rebuilt from the Pink Sheet column, so figures downloaded earlier can differ (median gap of about 5% over the common period).
• Breaks in grade and price basis. The energy content steps down from 6,667 kcal/kg before 2002 to 6,300 kcal/kg in 2002–2014 and 6,000 kcal/kg from 2015, and the price becomes a futures price in February 2022. The file keeps every segment unmodified, so long comparisons span slightly different products.
• Alternative sources. ICE futures and the originating auction or indicator bodies provide higher-frequency or contract-specific quotes.

Common Pitfalls When Using This Series

1. Confusing nominal and real prices. This series is nominal. Comparing an early-1990s reading to a recent one without adjusting for cumulative inflation overstates the real change. Deflating by CPI gives the true purchasing-power move.
2. Reading the monthly average as a market price. Headlines quote exchange futures; this dataset reports the monthly benchmark average. The two diverge most during fast-moving rallies.
3. Unit confusion. This series is Newcastle thermal coal FOB, at 6,000 kcal/kg since 2015 and at higher energy content before; it differs from lower-energy grades (e.g. Indonesian 4,200 kcal at a fraction of the price) and from coking (metallurgical) coal, which is a distinct market.

Historical Regimes

1992–2003 — Low and stable. Ample supply kept Australian thermal coal cheap, between $22 and $41 per ton in monthly averages, with the low of the file in August 2002.

2004–2008 — China boom. Surging Asian power demand lifted coal from below $40 per ton in January 2004 to a then-high of $180 in July 2008.

2009–2020 — Decline and range. Cheap US shale gas, climate policy, and renewables pressured coal despite cyclical swings, between a high near $130 per ton in January 2011 and lows near $50 in January 2016 and August 2020.

2021–2022 — Energy-crisis record. The energy crisis, very high gas prices (driving gas-to-coal switching), and a war premium drove Newcastle thermal coal above $400 per ton from July to September 2022, briefly above coking coal. The monthly average peaked near $430 in September, the record of the file.

2023–2026 — Normalisation. Expanding supply, softer gas prices, and easing security fears pulled prices back from $318 per ton in January 2023 to a low near $100 in April 2025. Monthly averages were back between $130 and $140 from March to August 2026.

Related Macroeconomic Datasets

Commodity Price Hub

This dataset is part of the Eco3min commodity price repository: energy, metals, agricultural softs and grains, most of them from the World Bank Pink Sheet.

Explore the Commodity Price Hub

Sources

• World Bank: Commodity Price Data (The Pink Sheet), Monthly Prices, column “Coal, Australian” (CC BY 4.0)
• Newcastle (Australia) FOB thermal coal assessments (futures price since February 2022), the market basis of the Pink Sheet series

Dataset Reference

Eco3min Research. (2026). Coal Price — Global Monthly Price (1992-2026). Source: World Bank, Commodity Price Data (The Pink Sheet), CC BY 4.0.<br> https://eco3min.fr/en/coal-price-history-dataset/