Photo by: Bloomberg
PERTH (miningweekly.com) – The continuing ramp-up of the Maules Creek coal mine, in New South Wales, has assisted in coal miner Whitehaven Coal reporting a 160% increase in run-of-mine (RoM) production during the March quarter.
The New South Wales-focused company on Friday announced that RoM production for the three months to March had reached 4.7-million tonnes of coal, up from the 1.8-million tonnes reported in the previous corresponding period.
Saleable coal production increased by 85% on the previous comparable period, to 4.1-million tonnes.
Whitehaven pointed out that its Narrabri mine established another quarterly RoM production record, with the mine producing 2.18-million tonnes of RoM coal, and 1.79-million tonnes of saleable coal.
Production from the Tarrawonga mine remained stable, with 534 000 t of RoM coal produced and 465 000 t of saleable coal, while the Rocglen mine produced 207 t of RoM coal and 235 t of saleable coal. The Werris Creek operation also performed strongly during the quarter, with RoM production up by 28%, to 661 000 t and saleable coal production up 10% to 662 000 t.
Meanwhile, construction of the Maules Creek operation was about 93% complete, and Whitehaven said on Friday that the project was likely to be declared commercial from the beginning of July this year.
Pre-commercial RoM coal production from the Maules Creek mine reached 1.11-million tonnes during the quarter, while saleable coal production reached 986 000 t. This was compared with the RoM and saleable production of 94 000 t and 54 000 t, respectively, produced during the December quarter of 2014.
Whitehaven on Friday reported that coal sales for the quarter increased by 64% on the previous corresponding period, to 3.7-million tonnes, establishing a new quarterly record.