Norilsk, BHP to jointly mine Russian coal from 2015

Norilsk Nickel plans to start mining coal with BHP Billiton, the world’s largest miner, in the Russian Arctic from 2015, the first production to result from a three-year-old alliance between the mining giants. Their development of the Syradasai deposit could eventually produce more than 15 million tonnes of coking coal for the steel industry, as much as Russian market leader Mechel produced last year.

Nikolai Matyushenko, deputy director for production development in Norilsk’s transport department, said on Friday the project envisaged construction of a processing plant and power station at the deposit. While declining to say how much would be invested in the project, he said the joint venture partners planned to build a shipping terminal capable of handling vessels with capacity of around 70, 000 deadweight tons.

The Syradasai deposit is about 100 km from the port of Dikson on the Kara Sea, even further north than Norilsk’s Arctic nickel, copper and palladium mines.