Coal news and updates

Coal producer B&W Resources plans 2016 ramp up at Yellow Creek mine in Kentucky

Central Appalachian thermal coal producer B&W Resources believes it will have sufficient coal sales to support a planned production ramp up in 2016 at its new Yellow Creek No 21 surface mine in Knott County, Kentucky, a company official said Thursday.

"We're running a highwall miner and doing a little bit of stripping [at Yellow Creek]," said Bill Tallent, vice president of sales for the subsidiary of Canada's Lipari Energy.

Yellow Creek produced 105,286 st of coal in the first half of 2015, according to US Mine Safety and Health Administration figures.

While a ramp up will not occur in 2015, it would most likely will take place next year when Yellow Creek is expected to be producing in the range of 600,000 st annually for sale to US electric utilities, Tallent said.
"We're picking up a few spot orders, but nothing long term," he said. "All the utilities are buying from month to month."

Yellow Creek's output has been steadily on the rise this year. After turning out only 8,514 st in the first quarter it extracted 96,772 st in the April-June period, MSHA figures show.

Tallent said B&W tends to focus on utilities in the US Southeast, an increasing priority also for Illinois Basin high-sulfur coal producers.

"We can't compete with those guys in some markets," he said his Illinois Basin counterparts, especially low-cost longwall producers like Foresight Energy in Illinois.

B&W also continues to operate the Aces Branch surface mine in Leslie County, Kentucky. The mine produced 84,681 st in the first two quarters of this year and 159,940 st last year, MSHA figures show.

Tallent described B&W as "just plugging along, bidding everything [coal solicitations] that comes out, although it's hard to bid at these low prices. We're going to be one of the survivors, we hope."

Lipari went public in Canada in 2011. It acquired B&W in September 2008.

source: http://www.platts.com