Major Hunter Valley Coal Mines Not Affected By Australian Floods
June 17 2011 - 2:14AM
Dow Jones News
Major miners in Australia's Hunter Valley haven't been adversely
affected by floods that have seen parts of the world's largest coal
export basin declared natural disaster zones in recent days.
The region's largest miners--Xstrata PLC (XTA.LN), Coal &
Allied Industries Ltd. (CNA.AU), and BHP Billiton Ltd. (BHP)--said
operations were running normally, as did Gloucester Coal Ltd.
(GCL.AU), which operates mines in the Gloucester Basin to the north
of the coal port of Newcastle.
Storms and flooding along the central and northern coast of New
South Wales state have seen the state's police and emergency
services minister Michael Gallacher declare 14 areas natural
disaster zones, including the council areas of Cessnock,
Muswellbrook, Upper Hunter and Gloucester in the state's coal
belt.
At Newcastle port, the world's largest coal export harbor and
the point of departure for most Hunter Valley coal, benchmark
front-month thermal coal futures traded on the InterContinental
Exchange slipped Thursday to $119.60 a metric ton, down from
$121.75 Tuesday.
Flooding in the Bowen Basin region of neighboring Queensland
state from November to January caused a 50% spike in the price of
coking coal used in steelmaking as rainfall inundated mine sites,
access roads and coal railways.
The Hunter exports just under 100 million tons of coal annually,
accounting for around one eighth of the global seaborne trade of
846 million tons.
-By David Fickling, Dow Jones Newswires; +61 2 8272 4689;
david.fickling@dowjones.com
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