Breaking records in the coal industry

THE fifth-largest exporter of coal in the world, Richards Bay Coal Terminal (RBCT) enjoyed a record-breaking year in 2017 amid a major upgrade project and despite losing 38 days’ operations to adverse weather conditions.

Thanking Transnet National Ports Authority (TNPA) and Transnet Freight Rail (TFR), for the support, RBCT Chairperson Nosipho SiwisaDamasane said such public/private partnerships are crucial.

In August, RBCT broke its import tonnage record, with a total for the month of 7.5-million tonnes offloaded from trains.

In December the company broke its export tonnage record for the year with a total of 76.5-million tonnes.

Averaging 27 coal-laden trains per day for the year, RBCT peaked at 38 trains in one day, and has the capacity to average 32 per day.

Tonnage exported by RBCT in 2017 was up 5.1% on 2016’s performance.

In total, RBCT offloaded 75.59-million tonnes of coal and loaded 76.47-million tonnes.

Slightly down on 2016’s numbers, 907 vessels were loaded last year, but the Cape size vessels increased from 232 in 2016 to 279 last year.

Almost 82% of RBCT’s coal is exported to Asia, with India the highest importer on the Asian continent at 35.76-million tonnes.

Only 10% is exported to Europe and 7.8% to the rest of Africa.

Tonnage railed to RBCT rose by 3.9% on 2016’s figures.

Talking about the installation of two new shiploaders, which were commissioned in September and October, Siwisa-Damasane said it was ‘not a joke’ that a project of that magnitude was delivered on-time and onbudget.

From cutting the belt on the old machines to the completed installation of the new ones, only six days per machine were lost.