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JOHANNESBURG – South African diversified miner Exxaro plans to develop a new coal mine in the Waterberg field that will supply 13-million to 15-million tons of coal for exports each year, a senior official said on Thursday.

Exxaro is one of the largest coal producers in the country, supplying coal to power utility Eskom and for exports.

"We are looking at another greenfields project which is geared at the export market. It will give us the opportunity to export to the tune of between 13-million and 15-million tons," Mxolisi Mgojo, the head of Exxaro's coal unit, told a Coaltrans conference in Johannesburg.

The project will happen between 2018 and 2025, he added.

Exxaro is currently finishing the construction of the Grootegeluk expansion project, a mine that will feed coal to state-owned Eskom's new Medupi power station.

Mgojo said the company will be ready to start shipping coal to Eskom for testing by the end of this month.

Exxaro's planned Thabametsi mine, which previously was meant to supply a future Eskom mine, will now be built to supply a power plant of up to 2 000 MW that will be built by an independent producer and come online between 2015 and 2025.

South Africa is seeking to break up a monopoly long held by Eskom and bring new capital into the sector by allowing independent power producers to build and operate plants, especially as Eskom has been struggling to find all the money needed to build new plants and meet a rising demand for power.

Mgojo said the timing of all the projects will depend on the availability of rail and water infrastructure.