A week in coal: 18 – 22 January 2016

Published by Harleigh Hobbs, Editor
World Coal, Friday, 22 January 2016 16:30

Reactions to US governments’ plan to stop new coal leases

The US government halting new coal leases on federal land while it undertakes a comprehensive review of the federal coal programme has been met with discontent.
Institute of Energy Research President, Thomas Pyle, has released a scathing attack on the Obama administration’s decision to halt the grating of new coal leases on federal land.
US Rep. Ed Whitfield, Chairman of the Energy and Power Subcommittee, criticises the US Department of Interior’s regulation on federal coal leasing and management.
The American Coal Council has attacked the federal coal lease moratorium as another slice in the Obama administrations “death-by-a-thousand-cuts’ policy towards coal.

Peabody's North Antelope Rochelle mine reaches a major production milestone by shipping its 2 billionth short ton of coal.
Kibo Mining has received results from Geotechnical Drill Programme for the Mbeya Definitive Mining Feasibility Study.
A mine wall collapse at Warkworth and a dam overflow at Bengalla makes it three spills in a month from Hunter Valley coal mines.
Peabody’s Wambo coal mine in New South Wales has reported a dam breach resulting in a discharge of sediment-laden water into the environment.
CoAL awards Optimisation Study and Front End Engineering and Design package to DRA Global’s South African company DRA Projects SA.

Peabody Energy enters definitive agreement to sell it interest in Prairie State Energy Campus: a 1600 MW coal-fired plant and adjacent coal mine in Illinois, USA.
Anglo American enters into a Share Sale Agreement with Batchfire Resources Pty to sell its 100% interest in the Callide thermal coal mine in Queensland, Australia.

A fall in coal throughput at Port of Amsterdam helped to drag total transshipment down at the four North Seam Canal Area ports.
The Indian Ministry of Shipping has launched a campaign to clean and green India’s thirteen major ports.
The major Indian ports recorded an 11.75% increase in thermal coal imports and 2.5% increase in metallurgical coal imports between April and November 2015.
US LNG exports have been vaunted by the US coal industry as cause for rising US gas prices and therefore rising US coal demand. But this hope may be misplaced.
Port of Rotterdam saw coal throughput rise 1% in 2015 despite a fall in German thermal coal demand.

BHP Billiton has reported 3% falls in its metallurgical and thermal coal production as operations were hit by geological difficulties and heavy rain in Australia, while draught hit the company in Colombia.
Rio Tinto announces 4Q15 results: hard coking and thermal coal production was in line with 2015 guidance, while semi-soft coking coal production was above the top end of the guidance range.
South32’s coal production fell in the six months to December 2015 on the back of challenging geology at two of its Australian mines.
Australian rail freight operator, Aurizon, reported a fall in coal volumes in 4Q15 on the back of increased competition and falling production volumes.

A report, Scottish CO2 Hub – A unique opportunity for the UK, published by Scottish Carbon Capture & Storage has detailed a concept that could lead the way for deployment of CCS in the UK and Europe.
Miners and mining equipment suppliers have made RobecoSAM’s “The Sustainability Yearbook” – although on one in the Coal & Consumable Fuels category.

Read the article online at: https://www.worldcoal.com/coal/22012016/weekly-coal-news-highlights-18-22-january-2016-100/

Thursday 13 March 2025 09:00

To celebrate 20 years of Yancoal’s Australia operations, WesTrac helped roll out a new fleet across the company’s New South Wales sites.