Hazelwood closure could mark beginning of end for Victoria's brown coal

French energy giant Engie is considering closing Hazelwood power station in a move that could signal the beginning of the end for the cheap brown coal power that helped build Victoria's post- World War II industry, according to the Australian Financial Review.

Luke van der Meulen, president of the Morwell branch of the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union, said closure would be devastating and called on the Victorian and federal governments to step in with a plan to diversify the La Trobe Valley economy away from coal.

Mining stocks the next hot sector, says UBS

The Sydney Morning Herald reports that the next hot sector is small cap mining stocks, according to UBS.

The miners that have managed to make it through the savage downturn following the nation's biggest mining boom are now poised to reap the benefits of their survival skills, it says.

Investors remain nervous about the resources sector amid the prospect of higher interest rates in the US sending the US dollar higher, while the Australian dollar continues to bounce around and as a result is clouding the outlook for commodities, UBS Small Companies Fund portfolio manager Stephen Wood said.

BHP will decide on expansion in three years

BHP Billiton will take another three years before deciding if heap leaching technology will ultimately allow a big expansion of the Olympic Dam copper and uranium mine, as it first pursues a more sedate underground mining push into the large, untouched part of the ore body originally earmarked for a massive $30 billion open pit, according to the Australian Financial Review.

But the boss of the Olympic Dam mine, Jacqui McGill, says the current smaller-scale stepping up of production at what she concedes is the most complex of the 40 operations in BHP Billiton's global mining stable, won't allow the mining giant to fully maximise the sweet spot of global copper demand.