The company is hoping to export coal back to India by 2014 from a 60 million tonne per annum open cut and underground coal mine, according to its application documents lodged with the department yesterday.
Adani, which is India’s largest coal importer, earlier this year purchased Linc Energy’s exploration projects in the Galilee Basin, containing 7.8 billion tonnes of thermal coal, in a $750 million deal.
The company, which recently opened its Australian headquarters in Brisbane and with Hancock Coal is exploring a 500-kilometre rail link to ports, has reportedly been in talks with Coal India for a long-term supply agreement that could include equity participation in its Australian projects.
Adani’s Carmichael mine, rail and port project is expected to employ 5000 people during construction and operation.
Carmichael, which will begin as a 2Mtpa operation and increase over eight years to 60Mtpa, will be located at Moray Downs, 160km northwest of Clermont.
The company is also proposing the construction and operation of a rail link to transport coal between the mine and export terminals located at the Port of Abbot Point and/or Port of Hay Point.
Up to 20% of higher ash run-of-mine coals may be washed and blended with lower ash bypass coals onsite. It is proposed that the project will operate 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
The overall workable length of the mine will be approximately 45km.
It is assumed that mining operations will be by owner/operator using large electric shovels and/or excavators, and trucks for both waste removal and coal mining.
The detailed infrastructure layout has not been designed but services within the minesite are expected to include potable water, communications, power reticulation and process water; fuel storage (about 2.5 million litres of fuel) and filling; haul truck wash (two allowed for, capable of washing 140t-plus mine trucks); workshops and stores capacity suitable for a 30Mtpa fleet; administration and bathhouse for up to 850 site staff; carparking allowance for up to 300 vehicles; and tyre bay and watercart filling station.
Materials handling will include internal haul roads from pit top to ROM pad; ROM pad with dual 400t dump stations; feeder breakers at dump station discharge prior to crushing stations, reducing the ROM coal down to
A bypass system utilising a roller screen has been allowed for between the secondary and tertiary sizing, and conveyors from the crusher station discharge to stockpiling systems.
An optional coal washery is also being considered which would include a separate coal handling and preparation plant dump station that may be required for processing high-ash coal before feeding it back into the proposed stockpile system, and a 2.4Mt capacity (4 weeks production) coal stockpile supplied by dual stackers.
Three rail alignments are currently proposed: one linking to the Alpha Rail alignment – a rail line that is proposed for construction by Hancock Prospecting linking the Alpha mine and Abbot Point; one along the Goonyella line between Moranbah and Dudgeon Point (Port of Hay Point); and a third option linking to the Port of Abbot Point via a greenfield Adani rail line.
“It is assumed that both the Alpha railway and the Goonyella system will be operating at capacity when Adani seeks access,” the company said in its submission.
“Therefore any additional trains Adani runs on existing systems will require corresponding upgrades to existing track capacity to avoid negatively impacting existing operations. This may require duplication of the existing lines.
“Other alternative rail options to Dudgeon or Abbot Point may be considered if required.”
