JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – ASX-listed coal-miner Riversdale Mining would submit a feasibility study and an environmental-impact study (EIS) for its proposed plan to transport coal by barge along the Zambezi river, in Mozambique, to that country’s government during the second half of next year.

The company on Monday said that it had completed a series of studies on the Zambezi river to confirm the viability of large-scale barging of coal to an offshore floating transloading vessel, adding that it had found no physical impediments to coal barging on the river.

However, it highlighted that some dredging might be required on some sections of the river.

The implementation of large-scale barging would be dependent on the completion and approval of an EIS and an environmental management plan, the licensing of barging and transloading operations over 560 km between Tete and Chinde and stakeholder and community consultation in the Zambezi river valley.

An EIS had started in August, while stakeholder consultation with communities and government in Tete, Chimoio, Beira and Maputo had been held in September.

The coal-miner planned also to continue with further specialist studies during the current quarter, it said in a statement.

ZAMBEZE PROJECT

Meanwhile, the company also reported that it had completed the first coal resource estimates for its Zambeze project, near Tete, in Mozambique, which would be Riversdale’s second coal project in the Moatize basin.

The project, which is situated adjacent to the miner’s Benga coal project, had an estimated total coal resource of 1,7-billion tons.

“The considerable effort of our team in Mozambique has now delivered another potential tier-one project with similar coal to Benga, yet likely to be a significantly larger scale operation. A second coking coal project of this size positions Riversdale Mining as a preferred supplier to the steel industry in the rapidly developing markets of Brazil and India,” executive chairperson Michael O’Keeffe commented.

The Benga project, which was a joint venture between Riversdale and India’s Tata Steel, was expected to produce about 1,7-million tons a year of hard coking coal and 0,3-million tons a year of export thermal coal when stage-one mine production starts in early 2011.

Riversdale noted that the tenement for the Zambeze project was close to all major required infrastructure, including: power, water, roads, rail, an international airport and direct access to the Zambezi river.

The project could potentially produce export hard coking coal as well as a secondary thermal coal product suitable for the Indian and African markets.

An extensive drilling programme and coal quality and market studies would now be undertaken to determine the feasibility of a large-scale openpit development.