Brazilian diversified miner Vale has already spent $300-million on the development of the mine industrial complex at its Moatize coal mine, in Mozambique, and has increased estimates for coking coal production to 12,7-million tons a year in the first stage of development, Vale financial GM Fabio Bechara said last week.

This was compared with its previous forecast of 8,5-million tons a year of coking coal.
Bechara noted during the eighth Coaltrans conference that the $1,3-billion project, which was expected to deliver its first coal to the market in the first half of 2011, would produce about 2,4-million tons a year of export thermal coal and 2,5-million tons a year of coal for a local power plant.

The company could increase coal supply to the local power plant, but this was restricted by the capacity of the transmission lines that were being used, said Bechara. Meanwhile, he noted that the rehabilitation of the Sena–Beira railway line, on which coal would be transported from Moatize to the Beira port, would be completed in the first quarter of next year.

This would allow for the export of between six-million tons a year and eight-million tons a year of coal. However, Bechara highlighted that this limited capacity would not be enough, as other coal producers would also soon require export capacity once the infrastructure was in place. An upgrade of the line, which could boost capacity to about 18-million tons a year, could be considered at a later date as an additional investment, he said.

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