PERTH (miningweekly.com) – Construction on the A$21.7-billion Carmichael coal and rail project is expected to start in August, Indian major Adani confirmed to Mining Weekly Online.
Chairperson Guatam Adani told a media conference in Mumbai that the outstanding approvals and licences were in the pipeline for approval and were expected “within the next couple of months”.
A spokesperson for Adani also told Mining Weekly Online that financial close of the project would occur shortly before work on the Queensland project started.
Adani has reportedly applied for financing from the Northern Australian Infrastructure Facility, to partly fund the multibillion-dollar project.
The proposed Carmichael project will comprise an opencut and underground mine, running for a period of 90 years and producing an average 60-million tonnes a year of thermal coal.
The Carmichael coal, railway and port project includes building Australia’s largest thermal coal mine, linked by a new 388 km standard gauge rail line to a new terminal at Abbot Point port near Bowen. It received approval from Queensland Natural Resources and Mines Minister Andrew Lynham in April last year, despite unresolved legal challenges and the prospect of further court appeals.
The project has been inundated with legal challenges, with the Queensland Supreme Court in November last year dismissing two challenges to the granting of a mining lease and environmental approvals.
Edited by: Chanel de Bruyn
Creamer Media Senior Deputy Editor Online
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