PERTH (miningweekly.com) - The federal Environment Minister Tony Burke has conditionally approved coal miner Whitehaven Coal’s development of the Maules Creek project, in New South Wales.

The Minister also approved the nearby Boggabri mine.

Burke said on Monday that with the conditions in place and subject to further work being agreed, he was satisfied the projects could go ahead without unacceptable impacts on the environment.

The approval conditions included a strict clearance limit for native vegitation, management plans to improve the ecological community and threatened species habitat, and a A$2.5-million investment in rehabilitation research and contributions to threatened species recovery actions.

The Minister called on the two projects to work together to minimise their cumulative impacts on the Leard State Forest and to maximise their biodiversity outcomes through their required offsets.

Burke’s decision comes only four days after the federal government extended its consideration timeline on the project until the end of April.

He said that he had brought the decision on the project forward after the New South Wales government leaked commercially sensitive information about the project, and warned that the state government would henceforth not be consulted over any further conditions on the projects.

“The development of these further conditions will be conducted without reference to the NSW government, which is unfortunate but a decision that they have effectively made for themselves.”

The Maules Creek’s current resources were expected to support a large opencut mining operation for in excess of 30 years at an average saleable coal production rate of around 10.8-million tons a year.

Subject to the delivery of all necessary approvals, the Maules Creek project was expected to be commissioned and first coal production would commence in mid-2013, with saleable production exceeding 10-million tons a year from 2016 onwards.