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Again from "The News"

Miner unfazed

"By Keira Stephenson"

Despite hold-ups caused by “vigilante” environmental
groups, Bathurst Resources remains
optimistic about its coal-mining prospects on the
Denniston Plateau.
The company still had a target of beginning
production at the Denniston Escarpment Mine in
the fi rst half of next year, Bathurst chief executive
Hamish Bohannan told an investor’s conference
call yesterday.
If mediation with the groups appealing against
the mining consent succeeded, Bathurst should
still be able to keep to its planned timeframe.
This would mean starting work at the Escarpment
Mine in April next year, and the Western
Whareatea mining area by July 2013, said Mr
Bohannan.
To use the expression of one of the conference
callers, it really was “two vigilante” groups, Forest
and Bird and the West Coast Environment Network
who were holding things up, he said.
“That’s pretty much the key issue. The incredible
thing is we’ve got strong support locally and
across the nation… I’m confi dent that with a pragmatic
approach we can reach some reasonable
solution.”
Mr Bohannan said Judge Jane Borthwick had
been appointed to preside over the Environment
Court hearing. A pre-hearing date would be set in
the near future and he did not yet know when the
court hearing would begin.
Bathurst was still in a very good position to
mediate and there would be a very strong net environmental
gain through the process. Bathurst had
reached agreement with most people, but still had
to reach agreement with some.
The Fairdown/Whareatea Residents Association
had indicated it was keen to engage in mediation,
he said.
Asked how long the Department of Conservation
(Doc) access and concession agreements would
take, he said Bathurst was hoping for a decision
either late 2011 or early 2012.
Doc has to invite public submissions on any proposed
agreements. If a hearing was required, the
process could take a year.
Pike River Coal Mine took 14 months to build
infrastructure for a deep underground mine.
Mr Bohannan said Bathurst planned to take six
months. It effectively had its the plans sitting on
Brightwater Engineering’s desk waiting to go.
Coal on the plateau was low ash. Not all of it
needed to be washed, so any delay to building the
wash plant wasn’t critical to production.
Work on developing a plan for the whole plateau
was ongoing, including exploration drilling. There
needed to be consultation with all stakeholders
and more fl ora and fauna studies.
Escarpment delays aside, Bathurst’s other mines
on the plateau were going well.
The company had exported its fi rst trial load of
coal to Australia this week, to ferro-silicon producers.
“That sort of product gets a substantial premium
compared to hard coking coal,” said Mr Bohannan.
The fi rst hard coking coal should leave Westport
in November.
Currently, Cascade produced about 50,000
tonnes of coal a year, mostly going to Holcim, but
Bathurst was looking to double that.
The Western Whareatea exploration permits
had actually been the main targets when Bathurst
bought out Eastern Resources but it had acquired
Cascade in Buller, and Takitimu in Southland as
well.
Bathurst’s Coalbrookdale Mine had two underground
mining permit blocks and one partially permitted
open cast mine, said Mr Bohannan.
Work was scheduled to begin in late 2011 or
early 2012.
Bathurst expected to be producing around
250,000 tonnes from Cascade and Coalbrookdale
combined by next October, all to be shipped from
Westport.
Bathurst also had an agreement with Solid
Energy to rail 500,000 tonnes of coal to Lyttelton
for export, if required.
No substantial new infrastructure was required
to start underground mining at Coalbrookdale.
Unlike Pike River Coalmine, it was a very shallow,
low methane environment. Any gas would
have leaked out of the porous sandstone centuries
ago.
“It is not a high risk environment at all,” said Mr
Bohannan.
He seemed more concerned about road safety.
All coal would be trucked off the plateau, on the
same road as tourists visiting the Denniston Experience
tourist mine.
It was never a good combination having tourist
and trucking traffi c on the same road, he said.
“It’s not the desired way to do it... it’s a bit of a
Monte Carlo... when we get an alternative we’ll use
it.”