Group layoffs of retirees at PGG
In an interview published on the industry portal nettg.pl, Pietraszek was asked, among other things, about the reasons for the decision of the PGG management board regarding group layoffs of retirees.
As he replied, it is about the difficult economic situation of the company and the fact that it extracts and sells the quantities of coal that it was supposed to extract and sell in 2031-32 in the perspective planned in the social agreement on hard coal mining of May 2021.
Coal production and sales forecasts until 2032
“This document (..) assumes that in the years 2031-32 PGG will be poorer due to the mines: Bolesław Śmiały, Sośnica, part of Ruda and the Wujek section. As a result, it also has significantly lower operating costs. Today, with lower than assumed revenues – we will sell 17 million tons, instead of the originally assumed (last year – PAP) 20.2 million tons – our costs have only slightly decreased in relation to 2023,” indicated the president of PGG.
He added, referring to the same period last year, that the company will sell almost 15 percent less coal. With the price that PGG can obtain from buyers of thermal coal falling by over 30 percent, revenues are “significantly lower than last year.”
Decline in coal sales and the impact of renewable energy on the energy market
Pietraszek also noted that the energy production market after half of 2024 is dominated by further expansion of renewable energy sources and gas production. Despite the growth in energy consumption in Poland, production from hard coal has fallen, and from lignite it has remained at a similar level.
Pietraszek said that the large decline in orders for thermal coal from domestic producers is primarily due to uncontrolled coal imports in 2022-23, which will affect PGG’s situation at least until the end of 2025. He expressed satisfaction that the government has taken steps to export energy to Ukraine based on Polish coal.
Voluntary redundancy program and Bobrek mine liquidation
In the interview, Pietraszek also mentioned work on voluntary redundancy programwhich is to be directed to a group of “strictly dedicated employees” other than retirees, numbering about 1,000 people – regardless of the Group’s will to allocate specialists from Węglokoks-Kraj in view of the prospect of liquidation of the Bobrek mine.
When asked about the financing of the redundancy program, he said, among other things, that PGG had initiated work on amending the act on the functioning of the mining industry so that it would not be the Mine Restructuring Company that would liquidate the mines, but the coal companies themselves.
“We also support enabling employees of active mines to benefit from the protective package provided for in this act when the company requires restructuring, and not only when one of the mines is being liquidated,” Pietraszek added.
“I would also like to remind you that despite a nearly two billion gap in revenues caused by falling sales, we will manage not to increase the subsidy provided for in the social contract,” the president of PGG told nettg.pl. (PAP)
