Overview -

Keywords   Australia   coal   underground

Illawarra coal mining operations are located south of Sydney in New South Wales, Australia.

In 1796 coal seams have been discovered outcropping near Wollongong by William Clark and two other survivors of the wrecked Sydney Cove.

The first coal mine dates back to 1849 and the coal export port of Kembla was opened in 1883. Mt. Keira, region's most important coal mine, began commercial production in 1857 and closed over 130 years later in 1991. Pit ponies were still being used up to 1972 in Illawarra mines.

BHP Billiton owns and operates three high-volume hard-coking coal underground mines in the Illawarra and Wollondilly regions.

The mines - Appin/Appin West, West Cliff and Dendrobium - employ longwall underground mining methods and mine two coal seams located at depths between 180 m and 550 m.

Coal is transported by rail and road to two coal preparation plants where it is washed and blended prior of being exported overseas through the Port of Kembala or used by local steel producers.

Ownership Summary  Name: BHP Billiton    Interest: 100%    Note: Reference: 14 Oct 2008

In 2006-2007 Illawarra mining operations produced 8.89 million tones of clean coal

The air gas collected from mines is used to produce power - a world-first.

BHP states that it has an overriding commitment to health, safety, environmental responsibility and sustainable development.

A 2006 regional level evaluation report assessed that Illawarra mining operations produced $520 million in gross regional product and created 5,900 jobs that generated $278 million in household income.

Location - New South Wales is Australia's most populous state and it is located in the south-east part of the country. It was discovered by James Cook during his 1770 voyage and it was first colonized in 1788 by some 1,400 people embarked on the First Fleet.

Illawarra Lake and region were also first sighted by Captain Cook. They were later explored (1796) by the renowned Mathew Flinders and George Bass.

Also in 1796, Black Caesar - the first Australian outlaw - was shot and killed near Sydney by pursuers that were highly motivated by the five gallons of rum reward offered by Governor John Hunter, a man whose name would be later borrowed by the famous Hunter Valley.

During the same year a party of 17 survivors of a ship wrecked in the Bass Strait trekked up the coast toward Sydney. Fourteen of them had been killed by elements and hostile Aborigines but the remaining three men managed to reach Sydney in 1797. They brought news of coal seams outcropping in the Illawarra region. Learning that George Bass jumped on Governor Hunter's whale-boat and a short 8 days later he returned with hard coal specimens.

Location Summary Nearest Landmark: Sydney Distance from Landmark: 54km Direction from Landmark: SW Latitude: 34 deg 13 min S Longitude: 150 deg 48 min E Satellite Image: <click to view>

An October 1795 census found 1,362 male and 546 female convicts living in the new penal colony. For comparison, in 1820 there were 3,000 full-blooded Aborigines living in the Illawarra district. By 1899 their ranks were reduced to 33.

Paul Edmund Strzelecki was the first to provide a substantive description of Illawarra's Carboniferous fossils and to produce geological maps in 1839-1843.

Coal was first indentified at Mt. Keira by Rev. W.B. Clarke in 1839. Albert Mine near Mt.Keira was opened in 1849 by James Shoobert.

Port Kembala's first coal shipment was made in February 1883 when S.S.Arawata sailed out carrying about 2,000 tons of Illawarra coal.

For Aborigines Illawarra most likely meant 'high place near the sea' because the region's most prominent feature is an abrupt and almost impassable 750 m high escarpment that bounds a narrow coastal plain.

The 280,000 people city of Wollongong - 'sound of the sea' - is nestled in a coastal sea plain and enjoys a mild coastal climate with average maximum temperatures ranging from 17 C in the winter to 26 C in the summer. Summer days are cooled by local sea breeze while hot nights are sometimes relieved by a front of rapidly moving wind - the southerly buster. July and August are windy with westerly gale strong winds reaching 100 km/h. The first half of the year is wetter with occasional flooding events possible during the summer period.

Mount Keira forms part of the Illawarra escarpment and it is covered by eucalypt forest and rainforest cover. Plants include the cabbage tree, the giant stinging tree, tamarind, and red cedar. Echidna, wallabies, Rusa deer and the Australian king parrot also live in the forest. Numerous parks protect the wildlife and flora and they are big touristic attractions.

Property - The Australian continent began rifting from Africa and India during the Permian period. The eastward drifting of the continent was accompanied by a subduction event on its eastern side which resulted in a Permo-Triassic foreland basin (the Sydney Basin) being developed in front of the accreting New England Fold Belt.

Coal formation was facilitated by the existence of the new basin and by its close location to a higher ground, the New England Fold Belt (NEFB), which was covered by tropical vegetation.

Material eroded from the uplifted NEFB ended up in the Illawarra region and formed lithic sandstones and claystones. The lower Illawarra coal measures were deposited in delta plain conditions and their deposition was terminated by a marine transgression.

Reserves Summary Name: Illawarra Commodity: metallurgical coal Class: resources Tonnage:  Mt Grade: underground  Note: 20 years mine life Reference: 31 Dec 2008

Contemporaneous with coal deposition an important event was also recorded in the Illawarra region during middle Permian: Earth's magnetic poles shifted their position.

A subsequent marine regression created conditions for the accumulation of the upper Illawarra coal measures in a distal alluvial environment. The late Permian Illawarra coal measures contain tuffs/volcanic ash generated by a volcanic eruption which was possibly centered east of the present day coastline. Coal deposition effectively filled the basin.

Illawarra Coal mines two - Wongawilli and Bulli - of the region's nine coal seams at depths in the range of 180 m to 550 m. The 2.1 to 3.4 m in thickness coal seams are hosted by strong sandstone and shale strata.

The Bulli seam is positioned at the top of the Illawarra coal measures and outcrops in the Illawarra escarpment. It averages 2 m and consists of mostly dull to dull banded coal; it includes a sideritic layer that forms a regional marker. The in situ ash content averages 16.7 percent and the yield coking to thermal coal ranges from 66:18 to 70:14.

Operation - Illawarra Coal operates three high-volume underground coal mines: Appin / Appin West, West Cliff, and Dendrobium.

Appin Mine is located 37 km from Wollongong and immediately south of the town of Appin. Underground mining started in 1962. It mines hard-coking coal of the Bulli Seam at depths reaching 550 m.

Ventilation is provided by means of two shafts. Movement of people and materials is being done by an automatic winder and train through a 2.5 m by 3.5 m drift.

Longwall mining is the method of choice: mechanized shearers cut the coal at the face; the roof is propped by hydraulic means and it is subsequently allowed to collapse (after the coal face moved far enough); conveyors move the coal to surface through a 2.3 m by 2.6 m drift

The coal seam presents high methane content and the gas is drained to the surface by holes drilled in the coal seam ahead of extraction. The gas is used to produce electricity through a set of gas engines.

Mine Production Summary  Mine - Appin, West Cliff, Dendrobium    Capacity: 8.68 Mt/y    Rate: 23,780 tpd    Note: 2007 production Reference: 31 Dec 2008

The Appin West Mine is an extension to the existing Appin Mine. It was approved in 2006 as an underground longwall mining operation and develops important coking coal reserves.

Some 12 million tones of coal have been sterilized and mining operations were diverted from beneath the Nepean River. The site hosts a two mega liters per day water filtration plant that convert low saline underground water into industrial water that is being used on site and by adjacent mining operations.

In 2008 Appin Mines produced 6.4 million tones of met coal and 0.84 million tones of thermal coal.

West Cliff Mine opened in 1976. It uses a longwall and five continuous miners. Coal is moved to the surface by two conveyors.

The mine is a high-volume operation which extracts coal from the Bulli seam. Because of the high methane gas content the coal seam is drained before mining by drilling holes in the coal seam. The gas is also transported to the surface and used to produce electricity.

Dendrobium Mine is located adjacent to Mt. Kembla and 8 km west of Wollongong. Surface facilities are located on the Illawarra escarpment. The underground mine extracts coal from the No. 3 Seam (Wongawilli Seam) of the Southern Coal Field. Longwall mining operations began in 2005. The mine operates 24/7.

Dendrobium mine has a mine life of 20 years and it is approved to produce up to 5.2 million tones of coal per year.

The mine's coal is an essential part of the coal blend marketed as premium coking coal under the 'Illawarra Blend' name.

Process - Raw coal is transported by trucks, rail and conveyors to the company's two coal preparation plants located at West Cliff and Dendrobium.

The coal is washed and blended in order to meet customer's specifications. Preparation plants produce clean coal by using different combinations of drums, jigs, cyclones and flotation.

The West Cliff washery can process 1,050 tonnes per hour and the capacity to store 2.5 million tones of clean and raw coal on site. The clean coal is then trucked to Port Kembala for export or for use by the local Blue Scope Steelwork Company.

Processing Summary  Facility - West Cliff and Dendrobium    Capacity: 14 Mt/y    Rate: 38,400 tpd  Product    Commodity: coal    Quantity: 8.68 Mt/y    Cost:  USD/t    Note: 2007 production figures Reference: 31 Dec 2008

A train set is made of 30 or 45 wagons and can be loaded within one-and-a-half hour. Dendrobium mine raw coal is transported by means of a covered conveyor to the Kemira Valley Coal Loading Facility and then another 7 km by rail to Port Kembala for processing.

The Dendrobium washery can process 535 tonnes of coal per hour and is also able to store large quantities of coal.

At the Port of Kembla coal export terminals benefit from two stacking areas designed to hold 850,000 tonnes of coal. Stacking of the coal is being done by four rail-mounted luffing stackers each of them having a 3,700 tonnes per hour capacity. Coal is then reclaimed by two 5,000 tonnes per hour rail-mounted bucket reclaimers.

Environment and Community - BHP Billiton states that it has an overriding commitment of health, safety, environmental responsibility and sustainable development.

The most important challenge faced by the company's longwall underground operations is ground subsidence as a result of the controlled collapse of the roof and bedrock in mined out areas. The company has a successful track record of mitigating the effects of subsidence on roads, bridges, water courses, pipe lines, power lines, water pipelines and many other man-made structures.

In 2007, BHP commissioned the world's first power plant fuelled by methane in mine ventilation air. The mine is located at West Cliff Mine and during its first six months of operation destroyed 125,000 t of carbon dioxide equivalent and at the same time exported 20 gigawatts hours of electricity to the mine.

The company also operates Illawarra's first water treatment plant at Appin West. The plant processes low salinity underground water resulted as a result of mining activities and recycles onsite water thus reducing the mine's need for fresh water and at the same time increases the quality of water that gets discharged in the Nepean River.

The company works with local communities on different mining related issues, keeps them informed, listens and addresses their concerns - Community Call Line 1-800-102-210 (free call in Australia). For Dendrobium mine call 1-800-000-510. The company also provides funding and support for community projects.

In 2008 Illawarra Coal estimated that it generates employment for about 2,000 people, employees and contractors. Cheap met coal delivered to the local steelworks also helped in securing the jobs of another 16,000 workers.

The company estimates that it spends 248 million per year on local goods and services.