Rio Tinto Coal Australia
| Private | |
| Industry | Mining |
| Headquarters | Brisbane, Australia |
| Products | Thermal coal, hard coking coal, semi-soft coking coal |
| Owner | Rio Tinto Group |
| Website |
Rio Tinto Coal Australia (RTCA) is an Australian coal mining organisation, and is part of the worldwide Rio Tinto Group. In Queensland, RTCA operates the Blair Athol, Hail Creek, Kestrel and Clermont mines. In New South Wales, RTCA manages Coal & Allied's operations at Mount Thorley Warkworth, Hunter Valley Operations and Bengalla.
Blair Athol Mine, located in the Bowen Basin in Central Queensland, 25 kilometres (16 mi) north-west of the township of Clermont, supplied customers in Asia and Europe with up to 12 million tonnes of coal per annum.
Blair Athol Mine took its name from the historic grazing property, Blair Athol Station, named by pastoralist James McLaren, in honour of his Scottish birthplace. Coal was originally discovered on the site in 1864, however it was a century later that the true worth of the resource was realised, with the first commercial shipments of coal despatched in May 1984 to Japan.
Blair Athol Mine closed on Friday 23 November 2012, after its reserves were mined out. Its stockpile and train facilities will be used by the Clermont Mine, currently under development to the east.
Rio Tinto Coal Australia managed the operation on behalf of the joint venture partners - Rio Tinto (57.2 per cent), Leichhardt Coal Pty Ltd, owned by UniSuper, Rio Tinto and J-Power (31.4 per cent), and Japanese power utilities EPDC Australia Pty Ltd (8 per cent) and JCD Australia Pty Ltd (3.4 per cent).
The former mine site will take up to 6 years to rehaiblitate, when Rio tinto will get a $84 million bond back.
In January 2007, Rio Tinto Coal Australia announced the development of the $950 million, 190 million tonne thermal coal deposit in Clermont. The mine is estimated to cost A$950 million. The Clermont Mine is currently under construction, and is located 15 kilometres (9.3 mi) east of the current Blair Athol Mine, in the Bowen Basin region of Central Queensland.
When the mine reaches full capacity (expected in 2013), it will produce up to 12.2 million tonnes of high quality thermal coal. It is expected to have a life of about 17 years. Clermont Mine will employ around 400 people in the construction phase and approximately 380 during operations. Operations recruitment commenced mid-2007 and will continue through 2008 and 2009.
Rio Tinto Coal Australia's joint venture partners in the open cut mine are Mitsubishi Development Pty Ltd (31.4 per cent), J-Power Australia Pty Ltd (15 per cent) and JCD Australia Pty Ltd (3.5 per cent).
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