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Mine Facts

Based on coal quantity surveys, GEAC estimates there is approximately 2.1 billion tonnes of available coal within Loy Yang Power’s existing Mining Licence with a further estimated 1 billion tonnes associated with the exploration licence.

Mine Statistics

Mining technique - Open cut
Open cut area - 800 hectares
Coal output - 30+ million tonnes per annum
Mine perimeter – 13km
Mine depth - 180 metres
Coal seam thickness - 180 metres
Overburden thickness - 5-24 metres
Age of coal seams - 15-30 million years
Calorific value of coal - 8.15 Mj/kg
Moisture content - around 62 per cent
Ash content - 2 per cent
Life of coal seams with current mining - 40 years. (Total reserves will last several hundred years.)
Life of coal seams with current mining - 50 years. (Total reserves will last several hundred years.)


Coal Dredgers

Dredger 14 and 15 built by Krupp Australia
Dredger 16 built by Mannesmann/Demag
Dredger 27 built by Krupp Australia
Motor size up to 440 kw
Bucket wheel up to 13.2 metres diameter (10 buckets per wheel)
Bucket capacity up to 2.3 cubic metres
Machine size 190 metres long, 50 metres high and 5,000 tonnes in weight
Output - up to 4000 tonnes of coal per hour and up to 2500 cubic metres of overburden per hour.
Travel speed - 8 metres/minute (1/4 km/h)



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Transport Conveyors

Belt width - 2 metres and a length of up to 2 kilometres
Belt speed - 5.2 metres/second - 19 km/h
Total Installed conveyor length 20 kilometres



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Raw Coal Bunker

Total design capacity for six power station units - 70,000 tonnes.

This is sufficient to supply 6 x 500 MW units for approximately 19 hours.



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Overburden Stackers

Travelling stackers are used on the overburden dump to remove overburden from the conveyors and spread it, ready for land rehabilitation.

Loy Yang Power has two travelling stackers - TS4 and TS5.

TS4 built by MAN
Machine size - 107.5 metres reach and weighs 2100 tonnes
Output - 15,400 tonnes per hour

TS5 built by Krupp Australia
Machine size - 81.5 metres reach and weighs 1863 tonnes
Output 8500 tonnes per hour



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Environmental

Loy Yang mine is actively pursuing environmental goals in many areas such as water management and treatment, land rehabilitation and land use planning. To maintain stability within the mine, high quality artesian water at 32°C is pumped from underlying aquifers at an average of 270 litres/second, and is used to supplement water supply to the power station.



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