According to The Siberian Times, the mine will eventually ramp up to produce 10 million tonnes per annum of saleable coal.

“At present there are 303 employees at the mine, 134 of them miners and the other 169 made up of contractors who will continue building the rest of the facility,” the newspaper reported.

“This year parent company Razrez Arshanovsky plans to produce two million tonnes of coal, and by 2017 reach five million tonnes annually.”

The mine comes with the largest water treatment plant in the republic to help alleviate fears about pollution to the nearby Abakan River.

“There are further plans to build a modern industrial campus and a railway line to create a loading station for the coal,” the newspaper reported.

The declining value of the ruble and its proximity to Asian markets has helped make Russia one of the more competitive coal exporting nations during the underway coal price downturn.