Published in March 2010 Australian Longwall Magazine
The junior recently listed on the Australian Securities Exchange after acquiring all the assets in February of privately held Doyles Creek Mining.
The listing raised $10 million which will be used to fund exploration.
Doyles Creek currently contains a JORC-compliant 247.1 million tonnes inferred coal resource and sits nicely 10 kilometres from Xstrata’s United Colliery and Peabody Energy’s Wambo longwall.
It is also close to infrastructure and located 105km from Newcastle Port and 10km from a rail coal-loading facility at Wambo, and 35km from another facility in the Mt Thorley area.
NuCoal is headed up by chairman Gordon Galt, a mining engineer who has been working in the Australian coal industry for 35 years. Galt planned and started Queensland’s first longwall mine – German Creek Central – and was general manager at Ulan during the expansion of its underground operations.
He has been managing director at numerous companies and is non-executive director of Aquila Resources, Discovery Metals and Navigator Resources, and a principal of Taurus Funds Management which holds 15.1% of NuCoal.
Well-known in the longwall sector, Glen Lewis has taken on the role as NuCoal’s MD. Lewis has 30 years coal mining experience, including general manager of underground operations for Xstrata Coal NSW.
ResCo Services director Andrew Poole, is also serving as a non-executive director on NuCoal’s board.
NuCoal has already started drilling at Doyles Creek with the first two holes of a six-hole, 3600m program complete. The company is now aiming for an updated JORC-compliant resource early in the June quarter and is targeting a resource of 450Mt.
Following the six-hole program, NuCoal will then complete a 19-hole drilling program to upgrade the inferred resource to indicated status. The inferred resource to date has shown high-quality thermal and semi-soft coking coal.
There are potentially five mineable seams in the exploration license area with their depth compatible with longwall mining. NuCoal will drill all seams – Whybrow, Redbank Creek, Wambo, Whynot and Woodlands Hill – from 100m down to about 550m.
NuCoal’s vision of starting to build initial surface infrastructure at the start of 2013 followed by drift driveage, once approvals are gained, fits in nicely with expansion plans for the crowded Hunter Valley coal chain, according to Lewis.
“At the appropriate time, once we have the pre-feasibility and associated mine planning completed, we will approach the required stakeholders to negotiate access. With the current expansion underway, complete with take or pay provisions, I believe there will be capacity available,” he said.
Investment of $1 billion in the Hunter Rail Coal Transport network will increase capacity from 97Mtpa to 200Mtpa by 2011. Newcastle Coal Infrastructure Group is also building a third coal loader at Kooragang Island that will increase port capacity by another 66Mtpa.
Training mine
Not content with simply building a longwall mine, NuCoal also plans to extend the project by establishing a coal-centric training facility that will run in parallel with the mine development.
The facility will train new entrants and existing coal workers up to certificate level 4 under the accreditation of the Coal Training Package MNC04.
New entrants, of all classifications, will be given a structured training path to the industry.
“The board had identified the significant skills shortage the coal industry will face over the next decade and it was felt a centralised training facility, supported by appropriate industry partners, was the best way to manage the skills risk of the future,” Lewis said.
“This approach was supported by the coal industry via letters of support, strategic partners such as The University of Newcastle, the Hunter Valley Training Company and the Westpac rescue helicopter.
Ultimately it was further supported by the NSW government by the granting of the exploration license to Doyles Creek Mining.”
Lewis said the training facility also made sense financially.
“The incremental capital cost to provide the training facility is not a large impost on the proposal and the operating costs will be covered by a fee for service arrangement when companies provide new entrants to the facility for basic training,” he said.
The onsite training facility will provide participants with theoretical and practical mining experience, and will offer training rooms and workshop facilities, as well as accommodation and associated amenities.
NuCoal has already started drilling at Doyles Creek.
Update: NuCoal boosted resources by 70% to 420 million tonnes last week and drilling results are expected in December.
