Hard coking coal to lift Anglo

Globally diversified miner Anglo American plans to invest heavily in hard coking coal in Canada and Australia to deliver a compounded annual growth rate of 12% between 2010 and 2020 in terms of production capacity, higher than its peers, The Australian reports.

Chief executive of the company's Metallurgical Coal division Seamus French told analysts at a seminar in London yesterday that Anglo American was the third largest overseas supplier of metallurgical coal after BHP Billiton and Teck Resources.

French expects Anglo American will become the second largest supplier by

2020 based on available information about its peers' growth plans.

Anglo American's hard coking coal capacity growth rate will outstrip BHP's 6% compounded annual growth rate and Teck's 3% across the same period.

Federal oversight role to avoid another Alpha

A federal government officer will oversee future environmental approvals in Queensland to avoid a repeat of the volatile dispute over the $6.4 billion Alpha coalmine, The Australian reports.

After a week of negotiations, a new bilateral agreement was signed last night giving Queensland an opportunity to assess new projects under commonwealth environment laws.

Leaders lashed for failing to take heat out of foreign labour debate

Resource sector employers have accused Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott of failing to shut down "divisive and uninformed" criticism of skilled migration, amid fears that a ceasefire in a union campaign targeting West Australian federal minister Gary Gray could prove fragile, The Australian reports.

Australian Mines and Metals Association chief executive Steve Knott said he was disappointed that, despite hosting a major economic forum in Brisbane, the Prime Minister had "done nothing to cease the damaging and misleading arguments that threaten to derail our country's most promising mining projects".