The boardroom changes were in response to the resignation of Norman Seckold and came soon after Cockatoo informed the market South Korean shareholder SK Networks would pull out of a proposed $A313M investment in the company.

However, Seckold stressed the appointments were planned and not at all related to the withdrawal of the SK group.

Lawson has been chief executive officer since December 2011 and has 13 years’ experience in the coal sector.

Lochtenberg has been the company MD from its inception and will continue to lead the company towards its goal of being a coal producer.

“These changes reflect the company’s growth and development as an independent coal producer in an unrivalled coal sector and equity market situation in Australia,” the company said.

Seckold said he believed Cockatoo had significant growth opportunities and he looked forward to seeing it realised as he would remain a committed shareholder of the company.

In other Cockatoo news, raw coal quality testing at its Baralaba South project in the Bowen Basin intersected coal seams mined at its operational Baralaba colliery.

Cockatoo said Baralaba South seams were low in ash and high energy, as seen in the Baralaba mine.

The continuity in the two project areas comes after Cockatoo set up seven exploration rigs at its Bowen Basin projects, undertaking open-hole chip drilling and coal quality, with the aim of moving the projects towards mine planning status.

A total of 106 holes have been drilled at Cockatoo’s Bowen Basin projects, with 84 open holes drilled at Baralaba South.

The Bowen Basin projects extend from the Dingo project in the north to the Baralaba South project in the south.

The tenements have contiguous target areas covering about 56,320 hectares.

The total JORC reserves for its Bowen Basin tenements stand at 33.4 million tonnes while its Surat Basin JORC reserves total 300.8Mt.

Cockatoo is aiming to produce 2.8Mt of coal by 2014.