The long-haul, take-or-pay contract is expected to generate at least $A600 million of revenue for Asciano over the term of the agreement.

The deal includes performance hurdles and capacity obligations from Asciano’s Pacific National.

The new contract includes more than a doubling of the rail haulage task for Whitehaven Coal over the next two years and is expected to deliver a return on capital to Asciano in line with the benchmarks achieved on recent coal haulage contracts.

Asciano will immediately need to order one new train set to meet the contract, which will be part of the company’s $160 million capital commitment announced in June this year.

Asciano said all four trains provided for in that commitment had been ordered and underwritten by long-term, take-or-pay contracts.

Whitehaven has already invested in one train set expected to be operational in June 2010.

Pacific National will lease and operate this train set from Whitehaven as part of this contract.

Pacific National has obligations to invest in further trains as required by Whitehaven as its growth volumes come online during the contract period.

“We are aligning our port, track and above rail contracts to ensure we can deliver our long-term growth objectives in the New South Wales coal export market,” Whitehaven managing director Tony Haggarty said.

Asciano managing director Mark Rowsthorn said Whitehaven was becoming one of Asciano’s largest customers in NSW.

Asciano was trading up 1.46% mid-morning today at $1.74.