| Fri 14 Oct 2011, 15:00 | | OPT - Optimum Coal Holdings Limited - Optimum Coal quarterly operational |
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OPT
OPT
OPT - Optimum Coal Holdings Limited - Optimum Coal quarterly operational
update for the 3 month period ended 30 September 2011
OPTIMUM COAL HOLDINGS LIMITED
(Incorporated in the Republic of South Africa)
(Registration number 2006/007799/06)
Share code: OPT
ISIN: ZAE000144663
Issuer code: OPT
("Optimum Coal")
OPTIMUM COAL QUARTERLY OPERATIONAL UPDATE FOR THE 3 MONTH PERIOD ENDED 30
SEPTEMBER 2011
Optimum Coal, a leading South African coal mining and exploration group,
listed on the JSE Limited, wishes to inform shareholders and update the
market on operational performance at Optimum Collieries and Koornfontein
Mines. Optimum Coal owns 100% of Optimum Collieries and Koornfontein
Mines respectively.
Optimum Coal produced 3.755 million tons of run-of-mine ("ROM") coal
during the first quarter of FY2012, a decrease of 11% on the 4.175
million ROM tons produced in the 4th quarter of FY2011.
During the quarter under review, 1.46 tons of export/high quality
domestic coal was produced and 1.51 million tons of Eskom/lower quality
domestic coal was produced.
Table 1 - Salient Production Features at Optimum Collieries and
Koornfontein Mines for the 3 month period 1 July 2011 to 30 September
2011.
Production Q1, FY2012 Optimum Koornfontein
Units Collieries Mines
ROM production t`000 3.003 775
Eskom/lower quality domestic t`000 1.207 300
saleable (buy-ins)
Export/high quality domestic t`000 1.035 426
saleable
CEO Mike Teke commented "production performance was generally
disappointing for Q1, FY2012. We were unfortunately affected by lost
production time at both our operations during the 10 days of industrial
action which occurred between 24th July 2011 and 3rd August 2011.
Additionally, recent production at Optimum Collieries has further been
impacted by the current industrial action affecting Coalcor Mining (Pty)
Ltd, the Boschmanspoort underground mining contractor, which commenced on
Monday 3rd October 2011 and remains unresolved. Notwithstanding the
various industrial action effects, Koornfontein continues to perform
steadily and has met all requisite production targets during the quarter
under review. Our immediate focus is to address the wage and contractor
related issues at our Boschmanspoort underground mine and to ensure the
successful re-location of draglines to the critical Kwagga North opencast
extension area. TFR railings performance to RBCT has shown a material
improvement in recent weeks which has enabled us to substantially reduce
on-mine export stocks."
The above information has not been reviewed and reported on by Optimum
Coal`s external auditors.
www.optimumcoal.com
14 October 2011
Johannesburg
Sponsor
RAND MERCHANT BANK (A division of FirstRand Bank Limited)
Financial Communications Advisers
COLLEGE HILL
Date: 14/10/2011 15:00:01 Produced by the JSE SENS Department.
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