Centennial said its decision was in line with previous announcements that it would look at concentrating its efforts on its major operations and sell off its smaller mines.
An application to extend Newstan will be submitted “as soon as practicable”
Centennial mining and technical services general manager Andrew Myors said the submission of a “stand-alone” application would allow the State Government to consider the Newstan issues separately from the proposal to mine remnant coal from the Awaba lease by opencut.
“The two proposals, Newstan and Awaba, were originally included in the one application for a number of reasons … [including] changes in state planning legislation, because many of the studies necessary are common to both proposals, and to provide the local community with all the information regarding the company’s future plans for the area,” Myors said.
Centennial met with fierce opposition to the Awaba opencut from some Lake Macquarie community groups, who had voiced concerns the mine would be too close to homes and the Awaba school.
“Based on this strong community support for underground mining, and to provide more certainty for the 260 Newstan employees, the joint application for both projects will be withdrawn and a new application submitted as soon as possible for the Newstan extension,” Myors said.
The Newstan longwall has been experiencing difficulties since last year with problematic geology and equipment issues.
In its March quarterly report, the New South Wales producer said Newstan had continued to experience significant but intermittent difficulties with equipment reliability issues arising from damage caused to the old equipment.
The mine decided to relocate the longwall earlier than originally projected. During the relocation, the longwall will be thoroughly overhauled and a new and more powerful armoured face conveyor installed. The overhaul will allow Newstan to recommence production in LW23 in late June 2006 and, according to the company, "return to profitability".
Work is also progressing on a permanent solution to resolve the unstable atmosphere around LW21, with fly ash being used to isolate and seal parts of the old goaf (voids) in the previous longwall extraction area.
Centennial said when completed, this should allow the current expensive campaign of inertisation to be terminated. As a precaution for the future, the group is looking to procure its own mobile inertisation plant, reducing its reliance on the more expensive large-scale unit being used at present.
Newstan produced 2.385 million tonnes in 2005.
