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The footage is taken from the channel / @airproduction2015 / @skylinewalker The first information about coal deposits in the area of the Seversky Donets River has been known since the first half of the 18th century, when these lands were conquered by the Russian Empire. Thanks to the river, the concentration of many deposits eventually received the name Donetsk Coal Basin (or Donbass). With the development of capitalism in Russia in the 70s of the 18th century, intensive industrial development of coal in the Donbass began, growing at a rapid pace. In 1880, 1.4 million tons were mined, in 1900 - up to 11 million tons, and in 1913 - about 16.9 million tons. On the eve of World War I, more than 70% of all coal production in the Russian Empire was concentrated in the Donbass. During World War I and the ensuing civil war, coal production decreased significantly (up to 4.6 million tons, 1920). Before the start of World War II, 83.7 million tons of coal were mined in the Donbass, which was more than half of the coal production of the USSR. The maximum volumes of coal production (almost 200 million tons per year) were achieved in the Ukrainian SSR in the 1970s. By the time of the collapse of the Soviet Union, Ukraine ranked second in Europe in coal production after Poland. In 1989, 170.2 million tons were mined in Ukraine, which per capita then amounted to 3,500 kg of coal (in the USSR as a whole - 2,701 kg), in the USA - 3,516, Great Britain - 1,771 kg, France - 294 kg, Czechoslovakia - 7,913 kg and Poland - 7,039 kg. In the Donbass, coal-bearing areas occupy over 150 thousand km2, which is almost a quarter of the country's area. About 92% of Ukraine's coal reserves are concentrated here. Of these, approximately 34% are in the Donetsk region, and the rest are located in the Luhansk, Dnipropetrovsk and Kharkiv regions. The Donbass deposits are dominated by energy coal (56%), primarily used to generate electricity and heat for populated areas. Its main reserves are concentrated in the Luhansk region. Coking coal reserves, used to smelt ferrous metals, account for 44% of the total reserves. Recently, significant reserves of brown coal (almost 400 million tons) have been discovered outside the Ukrainian Shield - in the Kharkiv region.