Annual Coal Review 1987 COAL REPORT OBED

Last year represented the second full year of operation of the Obed mine, which started producing in the fall of 1984. The open-pit mine is 24 km northeast of Hinton, Alta., and is a joint venture operated by Obed Mountain Coal Co, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Unocal Canada. It is designed to produce three million tonnes per year of high-volatile bituminous C thermal coal. There are some 96 million tonnes of recoverable, clean coal in the Obed coal lease blocks.

Overburden is removed by a Page 757 walking dragline equipped with a 57-cu-m bucket and 91.5-m boom. A unique feature of the mine is the “Easi Miner ,” a conti nuous coal-loading machine which has an average loading rate of 1,500 tonnes per hour. It is possible to use the machine because of the very flat-lying nature and consistency of the Obed seams. The average dip is just over 1 1/2 % .

The run-of-mine coal is processed by gravity separation in coarse and fine Batac jigs and is thermally dried in rotating kilns. Neither of these systems has been previously adopted commercially in western Canada. The clean coal is conveyed from the plant site to the rail side loadout facilities by means of a single -flight, 11-km, overland conveyor to a 45,000-tonne live storage facility.

The coal is transported 960 km by unit-train over the cn Rail mainline to Westshore Terminals at Roberts Bank. Obed has the shortest rail distance to tidewate r of any of the producing coal mines.

In 1986 the mine produced and shipped about 800,000 tonnes of coal. There are 100 workers, all of whom are salaried. Cross-training practices have been adopte d; and during 1986 the mine concentrated on reducing costs to ensure Obed could continue to market in the prevailing price-competitive environment.

The mine supplied markets in France, Japan, Hong Kong and the U.S. (Florida and California) last year. Also, blended coal was sold to Korea.

The general outlook for 1987 is one of continued oversupply of thermal coal in the Pacific Rim and Europe. Obed will continue to try to be price- competitive and will market coal both as a thermal coal on its own and in any western Canadi an blends which meet the needs of customers.