The CHF will allow SouthGobi to add value to its coal by removing ash, or waste rock, and enable the blending of coal from different seams to create higher-value products, the company said.
Alexander Molyneux, president and CEO of SouthGobi, said: “This coal-handling facility will enable us to provide customers with coal that has a lower ash content and a more consistent quality.”
The new CHF, to cost approximately $25m, will be constructed between the Sunrise and Sunset open pits at the Ovoot Tolgoi mine. The facility is expected to be operational in early 2011.
The facility will include a 300-tonne-capacity dump hopper, which will receive run-of-mine coal from both pits and feed a coal rotary breaker that will size coal to a maximum of 50 millimeters and reject oversize ash.
SouthGobi said that key long-lead-time equipment has been ordered and it has begun excavation and site preparation for the CHF. Once commissioned, it is intended that the CHF will operate on one 12-hour shift per day, six days per week.
Annual capacity will be up to six million tonnes of coal on a one shift per day basis, and operating hours can be extended as mining capacity increases, the company said.
