Comment: Mine floods will ruin people's drinking water plus the poison will settle in dirt for vegetation to grow from which will contain heavy metals! Strange, they are not talking about the flooded uranium mines!
January 6, 2011, 12:28 AM ET By David Fickling
BHP Billiton, the world’s biggest mining company, is notoriously media-shy.
While all its major competitors in Australia have named the mines affected by the flooding that has hit Queensland state’s coal belt, BHP has said only that some of its 14 local coal products are under force majeure, without naming which products, or even which mines, have been hit.
But it’s unclear whether the rainfall has degraded reserves. Coals with lower moisture content attract premium prices because they have better burning qualities, and waterlogged coal sells at a discount.
In the northern part of the Bowen Basin coal region, floodwaters are receding. But Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology has warned that this wet season, due to last until March, could see further heavy rains hitting the Bowen. The effect on coking-coal prices, and even on the thermal coal used in power stations, could eventually affect homeowners’ electricity bills world-wide.
So BHP’s close-lipped position may in part be an acknowledgement that it is hard to pass comment on the effects of a natural disaster that may be far from over.
Read more:
http://blogs.wsj.com/dispatch/2011/01/06/amid-flood-chaos-quiet-from-bhp/#
