The plant, commissioned Monday, will provide greater flexibility in producing a range of coking and PCI coal products by targeting ash levels.
Pine Valley expects to start mining its coking coal seams late this month and expects to ship trial cargoes over the next few months.
Pine Valley open cut will be capable of producing 2.2 million tonnes but the company is waiting on permit amendment approval by the British Columbia provincial government.
The amendment application was filed with regulators in March requesting an increase from the currently permitted production level of 0.9Mtpa to 2.2Mtpa.
The company said that while it was not certain the mine permit amendment would be granted, it did not expect the application would be rejected.
