The consortium of Daewoo International Corporation and Korea Resources Corporation will join Whitehaven (70%), Electric Power Development (7.5%), EDF Trading (7.5%) and Upper Horn Investments (7.5%) as joint venture partners in Narrabri.

Of the sale price, $32.5 million has already been paid. A further $30 million will be paid by December 4 and the remaining $62.5 million by December 2010, subject to Narrabri Stage 2 approval being obtained.

The Korean consortium is also responsible for contributing 7.5% of the costs of the project from the start of last year.

The sale includes a market-priced coal offtake contract with Daewoo for up to 1.5 million tonnes per annum of Korean specification coal. The annual tonnage is benchmarked to 25% of the project’s annual production over the life of the mine.

The Narrabri mine, located in New South Wales’s Gunnedah Basin, will begin producing coal using continuous miners for longwall development in early 2010, while longwall operations are expected to commence in early 2011, subject to approvals.

The project will produce a low-ash, high-energy, low-sulfur thermal coal for the export market.