It’s interesting when you glance at the peaks, troughs and trends in Australian Longwall production. In just less than 20 years we have seen between 2 and 3 fold increases in total ROM tonnes with obvious economic-driven flat spots.

In a recent industry update (July 2016), “Queensland coal – mine and advanced projects” reported a 2014 – 2015 saleable coal increase of 14.7Mt to 243.6Mt compared to the previous financial year for all mining operations. The underground component –  42.6Mt, was won from 13 mines.

In the project space the report indicates that proposals for other new coal mining projects are continuing,  these include a number of very large scale thermal coal mines in the Galilee Basin. The report describes over 20 “advanced coal export projects” of which 11 projects have an underground contribution.

It all points to a positive outlook for the underground production to be enhanced with replacement and expansion capacity.

MEC Mining have an extensive benchmarking database that informs trends and productivity enablers ranging from face width and block volume to equipment and coal clearance capacities. For more information please get in-touch with our Underground Consultants.