Shenhua Group to enter retail oil market

China’s Shenhua Group Corp. Ltd. will open its first petrol station in northern China soon, underlining the coal giant’s ambitions of grabbing a share in the oil market that has long been dominated by three domestic oil companies.
The station, located in Erdos, north China’s Inner Mongolia autonomous region, will sell oil products liquefied from coal by Shenhua’s coal liquefaction factory in Erdos. The company’s Erdos subsidiary obtained its wholesale oil business license two years ago.
Shenhua’s move into the retail oil market will help diversify revenue sources for the state-owned enterprise, which is under the direct supervision of the Chinese central government.
Shenhua Group is a large coal-based integrated energy enterprise with businesses involved in coal production, electricity generation, railway transport, port, shipping, coal-to-liquids and coal-to-chemicals, and runs a complete supply chain covering production, transportation and trade. It is also the largest and most modernized coal company in China and the largest coal supplier in the world. The Beijing-based company was ranked number 293 in the Fortune Global 500 last year.