Gastar Exploration Ltd is going to publish a report on its Earning. it will release its second quarter 2008 results on Monday, August 11, after the market closes. In conjunction with the release, Gastar has scheduled a conference call for 9:30 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time on Tuesday, August 12, that will be broadcast live over [...]

Downer EDI Limited today announced that the company’s Mining Division, Downer EDI Mining, has signed long-term contracts with Peabody Pacific Pty Limited (Peabody) for its Millennium and Wambo open cut coal mining projects.
This follows the announcement on 21 December 2007 that Peabody had selected Downer EDI Mining as the preferred tenderer for these projects.
With a [...]

A revival of the coal industry in Wales was put forward as a possibility by Peter Hain today.
The Secretary of State for Wales said: “Fossil fuels are going to provide us with the bulk of our energy for the foreseeable future, coal included, so if we are going to tackle the urgent problem of climate [...]

Norway’s Norsk Hydro has agreed with Australia’s United Minerals Corporation (UMC) to explore the possibility of bauxite mining and alumina refining in the Kimberley region of Western Australia.
“A final agreement would give Hydro a 75 percent holding in a potential bauxite and alumina project, in line with Hydro’s strategy to grow in primary aluminium production [...]

Rio Tinto Group, the world’s second-largest iron ore exporter, is studying expanding annual production of the steelmaking ingredient by 36 percent in Western Australia, amid “tight” global supply.
Output may rise to 300 million tons from 220 million tons in 2009, Chief Executive Leigh Clifford said at a press conference in Perth, Australia. Sam Walsh, Rio’s [...]

Australia’s New South Wales state government has approved plans for a new coal export terminal at the port of Newcastle, which has suffered from severe congestion that has hurt the country’s coal exports.
The A$922 million ($768 million) terminal, planned to start operations in 2009, will add nearly two-thirds to the port’s capacity.
It will be built [...]

Australian coal miner Gloucester Coal Ltd. on Tuesday recommended shareholders accept a A$391 million ($320 million) offer from a subsidiary of Anglo-Swiss miner Xstrata Plc .
Gloucester Coal said the Xstrata Coal offer of A$4.75 a share was at a 33 percent premium to the one-month volume weighted average price of Gloucester Coal shares, and 27 [...]

Xstrata Plc, the world’s biggest exporter of power-station coal, agreed to buy Gloucester Coal Ltd. for A$391 million ($319 million) to extend the life of mining operations in Australia’s New South Wales state.
The cash offer of A$4.75 a share, which is 25 percent higher than Gloucester’s latest close, is unanimously recommended by Gloucester’s board, the [...]

Export prices for power-station coal at Newcastle, Australia, the world’s largest coal-export harbor, fell 1.8 percent last week after major producers and buyers agreed contracts for 2007 supplies.
The weekly index of prices for thermal coal for immediate delivery from the port in New South Wales state slid 98 cents to $52.63 a metric ton in [...]

A Blaenavon company which makes four types of cheddar says the temperature 90m (300ft) underground is ideal for its 40kg (90lb) blocks of cheese.
The cheddar is kept in purpose-made boxes for two weeks while it takes on a distinctive “marbling” on its surface.
Cheddar cheese was traditionally matured in Somerset’s Cheddar caves, from where it takes [...]