The Datong Coalmine Group Co Ltd is located 15 kilometers to the southwest of downtown Datong. It has a 1,827-square-kilometer coalmine area, 37.58 billion tons of reserves, and 15 large mines, with an annual total output of 34.5 million tons.

It also has five large modern coal cleaning plants, with an annual capacity of 15 million tons, as well as 16.59 billion yuan in assets, and 113,000 employees, for a very large State-owned enterprise.

The company mainly extracts weak caking coal from the Jurassic period and its world-famous, multi-purpose soft coal has stable quality, less than 10-percent ash, less than 1-percent sulfur, and a 28-megajoule/kg calorific capacity. Its clients cover a range of industries in electric power, metallurgy, building materials, and chemicals and it has a very high market ratio. It also exports 10 million tons of coal each year.

In addition to coal, the company is involved in construction, machine manufacturing, chemicals, metallurgy, and building materials and has a reputation for its charcoal, industrial ash-free anti-wear hydraulic oil, gunpowder, detonators, and adhesive tape.

The company is at the top in its scientific development and technologies for the coal industry and its technology center is among the top 100, with the highest standards and State Economic and Trade Commission approval. In recent years, the center has cooperated with colleges and research institutions in china and abroad and has been involved in a number of projects that dealt with key science and technology problems, and promote new technologies. Some of these were at the international level and 13 won national scientific and technological progress prizes, while 60 won provincial and ministerial prizes for the same area. Over the past decade, it has put 300 million yuan into scientific and technological development.

It has produced a total of 945 million tons of quality coal to date and has paid 11.7 billion yuan ($1.85 billion) in taxes, the highest amount in China’s industrial sector, and 2.5 times the total government investment/spending. In 1989, the company established coal industry standards to help develop it into a modern enterprise and won the national Golden Horse corporate management prize, and the national May Day labor prize. In 1992, it ranked at the top of the 100 best-known enterprises, according to China Enterprise News, Enterprise Management magazine, and Enterprise Management Press.

In 1997, the company was listed as one of China’s 120 experimental enterprises with State Council approval and it is one of 34 of Shanxi’s most competitive enterprises.