News Flash  26 October 2011

Mining Weekly

China Sept coal imports set record at 19.1Mt

China's September coal imports rose 15.3% from the previous month to a record 19.1-million tons, shipping in from as far as Colombia as utilities gear up for domestic supply disruptions, official customs data showed on Monday. Shipments from Australia posted the sharpest increase compared with the previous month, up more than 850,000 tonnes, while imports from South Africa rose by about 600 000 t to 1.77-million tons. Read More.....

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The business case for mining, managing environment simultaneously

Emerging coal company Ecca Group CEO Dale Packham says that, as a mining company works towards greener mining, investors will become secure in the knowledge that, owing to South Africa’s stringent environmental procedures and directives around the environment, a company will be monitored and will operate in the right way. Read More.....

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September 2013 set as ‘worst-case’ start date for first Medupi unit

State-owned power utility Eskom’s current “worst-case scenario” for delivering initial power to the grid from the first Medupi power station unit, or Unit 6, was currently September 2013, Mining Weekly Online has learned. The unit would be the first of six to begin producing at the R100-billion (R125-billion when interest during construction was included), 4 800 MW coal-fired plant, which was currently under construction near Lephalale, in the Limpopo province Read More.....

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Business Line

Railways chokes on coal short supply

Coal Ministry mandarins recently summoned senior officials of State-owned coal companies and reportedly urged them to pull up their socks or face consequences. The reason: a large number of power houses in the country are critically short of coal and therefore close to shutting down. But then it is not merely the power companies that face crisis due to the coal shortage; the Indian Railways too has been hit. Coal accounts for about 45 per cent of the traffic of Indian Railways. The fall in supply of coal has hit hard the major coal-loading zonal railways, which are also major freight loading railways. Read More.....

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Times Live

Call for state to fund railways

The proposed 1500km-long Trans-Kalahari line will link South Africa's Waterberg coal fields and other new mining projects in Botswana with Walvis Bay in Namibia. Closer to home, Transnet's proposed 165km link from Ermelo to Phuzumoya in Swaziland might be completed only in five years' time. The link would relieve pressure on the congested Ermelo-Richards Bay "heavy-haul" coal line, which is struggling to cope with increased export coal traffic. Read More.....

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Newsmaker: Jan Britz, loves the mining - but not the image

Jan Britz, a miner from Kuruman in the Northern Cape, has been appointed by black-owned mining and exploration company Sekoko Resources to make the most of its rights to the abundant coalfields of Limpopo.The Waterberg coalfield is on eight farms, and Britz says it holds about 40% of the coal reserves in South Africa, or five billion tons. Not all of this will be for Sekoko. The dominant and right now only, operator in the area is coal-mining giant Exxaro, where Britz himself held senior management and operational positions for 10 years. Read More.....