FUNGCOAL PROJECT Anglo American Thermal Coal Rehab planner Gustav Le Roux and Anglo American Thermal Coal environmental coordinator Dolly Mthethwa inspect the results of the Fungcoal trials on the Klipan discard dump at Kleinkopje Colliery
Diversified miner Anglo American’s thermal coal business, Anglo Thermal Coal, has developed and patented a bioconversion technology that it believes can significantly reduce the cost and improve the rate and quality of opencast mine rehabilitation.
The bioconversion technology, which claims “to do in six months, or in one crop growing season, what nature does in 60 years” has been trialled at four Anglo American coal mines and has achieved “extremely” positive results in certain applications at rehabilitated mining pits and coal discard facilities, says Anglo American mine closure manager Henk Lodewijks.
Known as Fungcoal, a combination of the words ‘fungi’ and ‘coal’, the bioconversion technology is being used in the R17.5-million project to harness fungi and weathered coal to produce natural fertilisers that are regarded as the building blocks of soil fertility and plant life.
The project is being undertaken in partnership with tertiary institution Rhodes University’s Institute for Environmental Biotechnology.
The partnership started in 2004, when Anglo Thermal Coal sought ways through which to accelerate and improve the quality of rehabilitation at its opencast mines.
“Research indicates that certain fungi have the ability to break down and liquefy coal that has been exposed to the elements. When accompanied by other microorganisms, they create humic and fulvic acids, which act as natural fertilisers,” says Lodewijks.
He points out that humic and fulvic acids have two important qualities – they promote soil microbe and plant growth and they significantly alleviate the compaction of rehabilitated soil – one of the greatest rehabilitation challenges currently facing the industry.
“As discard coal is used as a medium on which certain grass species grow, we significantly reduced the need for topsoil, which is a scarce and costly resource,” explains Lodewijks.
“Our aim is to restore the ecology of land that has been disturbed, using organisms that cannot be seen with the naked eye,” he says.
Rhodes University professor Keith Cowan adds that all organisms act in concert and enable the environment to resurrect itself, and that the Rhodes University research team has been fortunate enough to discover fungi and bacteria that are crucially important in the process in a relatively short time.
“We are discovering a complete toolkit of organisms for land that has been disturbed, which will ensure that it can be returned to communities for economic activity almost immediately after mining activity has ended,” Cowan comments.
The next step in the project will be to establish a thorough record of land that has been rehabilitated using Fungcoal to gain a greater understanding of Fungcoal’s use in other applications and over a longer period.
Engagement with regulators will take place as the project moves closer to the commercial phase.