In a presentation, Xstrata Group environment and community manager Dave O’Brien outlined the steps taken for the company’s advances in New South Wales on the issue of sustainable water management.

Talking to International Longwall News, O’Brien said the company performed a water-based audit on all of its coal preparation plants this year given their high usage.

To combat the problem at Xstrata’s Bulga coal preparation plant, the company looked to technology, introducing a new coal paste thickener, which O’Brien said basically squeezes the ultra fine particles out of the water and reduces the amount of water lost in the tailings dams.

The thickener combined with increased water recycling will contribute to an 89% reduction in Hunter River water usage at the mine, according to the company’s figures.

At Bulga’s underground operations, which draw on Hunter River water, O’Brien said a filtration system was put into place to re-use mine water in machinery cooling.

The system has also provided cost benefits apart from reducing the drain on available water resources, with O’Brien saying the company was projecting a 55% reduction in Hunter River water usage from last year.

O’Brien added the filtration system had been in use for over 12 months and had no measurable impact on machinery availability, which was an initial concern.

He said the technology from the underground project was easily transferable – meaning that other miners could employ similar water management methods.

Of the progress, O’ Brien said an important and positive step was to get the engineering side of the operations on board.

“Water management and even climate change is not just an environmental issue,” he said.

Peabody Pacific picked up first prize in the environment category of the New South Wales Minerals Council’s annual Environment and Community Excellence Awards, announced at the conference, for its use of polyurethane resins technology to repair cracking in a stream rock bar at the Waratah Rivulet.