Churchill Mining: Initial mining reserve statement at E. Kutai coal project
Monday, October 26 2009 - 08:03 AM WIB
The JORC Reserve Report, compiled by independent coal geology and mining specialists SMG Consultants ("SMGC"), defines an initial JORC Probable In-Situ Reserve of 956 million tonnes of thermal coal at the Company's flagship project in Indonesia. This reserve statement follows the resource upgrade in August 2009 of 1.33 billion tonnes of coal into the JORC categories of Measured and Indicated, from a total global resource of over 3 billion tonnes. The SMGC Reserve Report also describes a comparatively low cumulative average strip ratio of 3.6:1, which should result in excellent project economics.
Feasibility Study
The Company continues to move forward on the current feasibility study and other work associated with the project.
Tenders have been issued for all the main components of the project including the port and its facilities, the conveyor system, service road and power plant, along with all the relevant requirements at the mine site. All bids are expected to be in and reviewed before the end of 2009 so that the feasibility can be completed and the JORC Proven Reserve defined.
Churchill Mining's CEO Paul Mazak commented: "We are extremely pleased to report the initial reserve statement for the EKCP. This is a significant milestone for Churchill and its Indonesian partners. The size of the initial reserve, at just under a billion tonnes, demonstrates the world-class size of the project.
The Company believes that a project of this scale and magnitude is extremely attractive to end-users of thermal coal, particularly in India and China. With the value of EKCP being enhanced by the strategic location in relation to the ever-growing Asian coal markets and combined with the steady progress that has been made technically on the project, it is likely that the interest in the EKCP will increase". (end of release)