Gujarat NRE Minerals Ltd, Australian subsidiary of Gujarat NRE Coke Ltd, is in the final stages of commissioning its longwall at the Wongawilli hard coking coal mine near Wollongong in New South Wales.
Longwall mining is a form of underground coal mining, where a long wall of coal is mined in a single slice to increase the productivity of coal mining. The longwall panel (the block of coal that is being mined) is typically 100 - 350 m wide. As a result raw coal production at NRE Wongawilli mine will be expanded to approximately to 1,500,000 tonnes per year, up from 179,000 tonnes during the year 2008-09.
Gujarat NRE Minerals Limited Chairman, Arun Kumar Jagatramka, said the opening of the longwall was excellent timing, with an expected strong increase in demand for Australian hard coking coal, especially from the Indian market.
Gujarat NRE Minerals bought the Elouera mine from BHP Billiton in December 21, 2007, with the company resuming coal production in May 2008. Gujarat NRE Minerals also operates NRE No 1 coal mine (NRE No 1 Colliery) in New South Wales with a raw coal production of 670,000 tonnes in 2008-09. Longwall mining is also due to be introduced at NRE No.1 mine in 2012 with coal production expected to be increased to 3,000,000 tonnes per year. NRE No1 mine contains 300 million tonnes of hard coking coal resources.