Australia's Port Kembla coal terminal which ships thermal and coking coal exports from the Southern and Western coal fields of New South Wales is to halt its coal-loading operations for three days of planned maintenance between July 5 and July 8.
Port Kembla coal terminal general manager, Peter Green, confirmed the "programmed three-day maintenance shutdown" in an emailed response Friday.
Reports said the maintenance was due to start at 7 am Australian Eastern Standard Time July 5 (2200 GMT July 4) and last through to 7 am AEST July 8, during which time loading operations at the terminal would halt temporarily.
The terminal, located 70 km south of Sydney, saw an interruption to its coal exports May 5-10 when its No. 1 coal re-claimer broke down unexpectedly, while maintenance work was going on at its No. 2 re-claimer unit. Maintenance was cut short on re-claimer No. 2 and it returned to service.
There are three stackers, two re-claimers and one ship-loader at Port Kembla terminal and its stockpile has a capacity for coal exports of 850,000 mt, according to the New South Wales government's Coal Industry Profile handbook.
Port Kembla coal terminal is owned by its five users -- BHP Billiton's Illawarra coal subsidiary, Banpu-owned Centennial Coal, Gujarat NRE Coking Coal, Peabody Energy's Metropolitan mine and Xstrata's Tahmoor mine. It shipped 14 million mt of coal in fiscal 2009-10, according to latest available statistics from the New South Wales ports ministry.
