The Department of Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts is seeking public comment on the expansion project, which includes substantial infrastructure and mining equipment upgrades. The environmental documentation was made available last week.
BHP titled the expansion as the “Project underground mining operations”, but is seeking approvals for a large amount of works and activities in its environmental application.
Illawarra Coal aims to extend longwall mining beyond the current operations in Longwall 409 of Area 4, and Longwall 33 at West Cliff’s Area 5.
The next areas flagged for development include more ground within Area 7, along with the new targets of Appin West Area 9, then further west to Appin Area 8.
North Cliff is another zone to the east of the Appin and West Cliff operations, while to the south lies Appin Area 2 Extended along with Appin Area 3 Extended.
A key aspect of Illawarra Coal’s expansion project is an upgrade to the West Cliff Washery, which serves both longwall mines, to 10.5 million tonnes per annum of run-of-mine production.
The wash plant upgrade includes overhauls of conveyor systems, power supply, plus the installations of a rotary breaker and a triple roll crusher among other equipment.
Illawarra Coal also plans to upgrade its longwall mining equipment to increase coal cutting rates but did not provide much detail.
“Over the life of the project, it is anticipated that a range of underground mining equipment would be replaced or upgraded as a component of general maintenance or to increase efficiency,” BHP said.
Illawarra Coal flagged major upgrades to surface and supporting infrastructure.
These include upgrades to its water treatment facility, the methane drainage plants, and the bin and coal loader at the Appin East pit top, as well as buildings such as workshops and administration offices.
Illawarra Coal will also consider extensions of personal emergency device communication systems.
The company is also seeking approval for ongoing exploration, and the continued mine gas drainage and capture along with subsequent electricity generation as part of the Appin-Tower power project.
In addition, an underground coal wash emplacement trial is expected to kick off within five years of approval.
The trial will determine the feasibility and infrastructure requirements of using this technology.
Once the project kicks off, Illawarra Coal expects to hit 10.5Mtpa of ROM coal production for 6.3Mtpa of product coal by the second year.
From present estimations, the Appin and West Cliff mines are expected employ 1170 people, 20% up from the 975 expected during initial development and existing mining operations phase.
Appin’s mining workforce, including management, is tipped to reach 653 when the expansion hits 10.5Mtpa, while West Cliff is targeting 429 staff.
Project construction and development activities are expected to employ 100 people in the first year.
The project is targeting a recoverable coal reserve of 306Mt of ROM coal.
Under the separate New South Wales government approval process, Illawarra Coal is awaiting approval for Longwalls 705 to 710 within Area 7, also known as Appin West, while West Cliff received approval for Area 5 Longwalls 34 to 36 last year.
