The Chief Executive Officer of Anglo American’s Metallurgical Coal business, Mr Seamus French, today announced the Brisbane based global business had delivered an operating profit of US$405 million (AUD $391 million), a record full year metallurgical coal production of 17.7 million tonnes (Mt), total production of 30.6 Mt and a 25 per cent increase in export metallurgical coal sales volumes.
This performance formed part of Anglo American plc’s annual results announcement on 15 February 2013, which included a Group underlying operating profit of US$6.2 billion (AUD$6.0 billion) and underlying earnings of US$2.8 billion (AUD $2.7 billion).
Reflecting on the 2012 Metallurgical Coal business performance, Mr French said the stand outs for the 2012 financial year were the 28 per cent safety improvement, the record metallurgical coal production and the 20 per cent reduction in costs from the first half of 2012 to the second half of 2012.
"Despite the current economic climate, we have delivered a profitable outcome in 2012 and made significant operational changes to put us in a strong position to benefit when the market picks up and demand for hard coking coal inevitably follows," Mr French said.
"It’s no secret the mining industry has been facing challenges recently, particularly in the second half of last year with low coal prices, a high Australian dollar and additional taxes.
"Our focus has been on value-adding, increasing workforce productivity and optimising our existing assets as much as we can, and the record metallurgical coal saleable production of 17.7 million tonnes is testament to our success.
"The silver lining for our business is that we were extremely quick to respond to the changing conditions and reduced costs by 10 per cent on the previous year.
"Most pleasingly, we have done this without compromising safety. We achieved a continuous monthly improvement of 28 per cent on 2011 and we are reporting the lowest ever lost time injury frequency rate of 1.75.
"Operationally we have become leaner, more efficient and more determined, and a stand out example is our Moranbah North mine which recovered from a disappointing end to 2011 and lifted saleable production by 45 per cent in 2012.
"Another highlight from the past year was our world class five million tonne per annum Grosvenor longwall project in Moranbah moving ahead with construction and 15 per cent of the job is already completed," Mr French said.
Metallurgical Coal also made great progress as a global business.
"In December 2012 the government of British Columbia in Canada approved an Environmental Assessment Certificate for the Roman project, an open cut expansion of the Trend mine near Tumbler Ridge in British Columbia," Mr French said.
"This is a promising next step for us in Canada, as Peace River’s Trend mine is now performing solidly under the Metallurgical Coal management and production has increased by almost 50 per cent in 2012.
"Our plan is to build on this success by developing the Roman project which has the potential to produce up to four million tonnes of metallurgical coal per year,” he said.
Mr French said the long-term outlook for Metallurgical Coal was positive, citing its growth strategy to deliver world class hard coking coal underground longwall projects in Central Queensland and high-margin export open cut projects in New South Wales and Canada.
"In the short term our existing operations have proven to be adaptable and resilient to changing markets and looking more broadly, our premium project pipeline targeting the highest quality product means our future is strong and our growth prospects are extremely appealing," he said.
ENDS