Name of the Mine
South Walker Creek mine.

Location  
Queensland’s Bowen basin, in Australia.

Mine Owner/s  
Stanmore Resources.

Brief Description  
South Walker Creek is an opencut mine whose pulverised coal injection (PCI) is one of the highest performing PCI products in a steel blast furnace, owing to its low volatility matter.   

Brief History  
The mine has been operating since 1996. Stanmore acquired the mine from BHP Mitsui Coal in May 2022.

Primary Metals/Minerals  
Metallurgical coal.

Secondary Metals/Minerals  
None stated.

Geology/Mineralisation  
South Walker Coal is located in the Nebo Synclinorium, a structural subdivision of the Permian-Triassic Bowen basin.

The coal-bearing sequence of interest is the Rangal Coal Measures, and the target coal seams include the Main seam, and its component splits. This seam is equivalent to the Leichhardt seam and has a cumulative coal thickness of 5 m to 13 m. The Hynds seam occurs about 40 m from the Main seam and consists of an average 3.7 m of banded coal.

The Main seam is mostly split into its thick split component in the southern part of the deposit, while elsewhere, the seam is mostly represented as the MB2 seam.

Reserves  
Total proven and probable run-of-mine (RoM) coal reserves as at December 31, 2022, were estimated at 182-million tonnes.

Total proven and probable marketable coal reserves as at December 31, 2022, were estimated at 142-million tonnes.
Resources  

Total measured, indicated and inferred resources as at December 31, 2022, were estimated at 679-million tonnes.

Mining Method  
South Walker Creek uses a multibench, opencut mining method.

The mine includes a coal handling and preparation plant comprising the RoM dump hopper and crusher, the coal processing plant, product stockpile and train load-out facilities.

Major Infrastructure/Equipment  
The mine uses a dragline, and truck and hydraulic excavators.

Prospects  
The resource development strategy at South Walker Creek includes progressively opening and operating low strip ratio pits along the undeveloped strike of available resource, and mining the highest-margin strips to maximise and accelerate value generation. The Mulgrave and Central deposits have been identified as the next low strip ratio reserves to exploit, adding 58-million tonnes RoM (40-million tonnes of which PCI product).

Contact Details
Stanmore Resources
Tel +61 7 3238 1000
Email info@stanmore.net

Sources
Stanmore Resources. Website: https://stanmore.net.au/
Stanmore Resources. Coal resource and reserve update (October 31, 2022).
Stanmore Resources. 2022 Annual coal resources and reserve summary (February 27, 2023).
Stanmore Resources. 2022 Full year results (February 27, 2023).