Clean energy power station opened at Moranbah North

Case study

Employees Ken Olteanu and Neville Hutchinson at EDL’s Moranbah North Waste Coal Mine Gas Power Station, where coal mine gas is converted into electricity

Group Chief Executive Cynthia Carroll joined the Minister for Natural Resources, Mines and Energy and Trade, the Honourable Stephen Robertson, and Energy Developments Limited (EDL) Managing Director Greg Pritchard to officially open a new AUS$60 million, 45 megawatt Waste Coal Mine Gas (WCMG) Power Station at Moranbah North in September 2009.

Now operating at full capacity, the power station is delivering enough low emission, clean energy to power nearly 50,000 homes.

Owned and operated by EDL, the Moranbah North power station is supplied with waste coal mine gas (WCMG) sourced from our Moranbah North mine to run 15 – 3 MW engines to produce base load power to the grid, with the effect of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by more than 1.3 million tonnes of CO₂e annually, the equivalent of taking 330,000 cars off the road.

The innovative power station takes WCMG, which is 21 times more damaging to the atmosphere than carbon dioxide and other noxious gases, and turns it into base load electricity.

This project is the second time Anglo American and EDL have come together to reduce emissions, with another power plant previously opened at German Creek in 2007, also located in Queensland’s Bowen Basin. Both initiatives are testament to our commitment to reducing greenhouse gas emissions in Australia, while globally forming a significant part of the Group’s overall emissions reduction strategy.

The combined greenhouse gas mitigation benefits of the two power stations are considerable, estimated at about 2.3 million tonnes of CO₂e annually, the equivalent of planting 3.6 million trees or taking 580,000 cars off the road.