Downstream presenting exciting global coal-mining opportunities, says Anglo CEO Trahar:

New downstream energy-coal activities were presenting exciting coal-mining opportunities globally, Anglo American plc CEO Tony Trahar has told Mining Weekly Online.Trahar said that Anglo American plc had aligned itself in a very powerful partnership strategy in which it had the coal-mining expertise and multinational petroleum company Shell the coal-to-liquids technology.He said that Anglo's first step in coal-to-liquids was to study the large $4-billion-to-R5-billion Monash Energy Project in Australia, which required the moving of large volumes of coal and the very-attractive environmental storage of carbon dioxide in empty oil wells offshore in the Bass Strait.“This is new fringe project for both us and for Shell and we are going to take time developing it,” he said, emphasising that it was still early days.Trahar said new sources of energy were in growing demand the world over.China had indicated its intention to add value to its own vast coal resources and Anglo was itself investigating a large coal-to-chemicals complex in the Xiwan province of China.These downstream energy-coal activities, though still a fledgling part of Anglo's coal business, were presenting “very exciting” coal-mining opportunities around the world, though they would take time to build up.Anglo had entered the coal-to-liquids business with energy major Shell Gas & Power and had formed an alliance in the field of conversion of coal to clean liquid energy, currently dominated by South Africa's petrochemicals group, Sasol, listed on the New York Stock Exchange.Trahar said that the alliance would explore technologies that produced liquid fuels from nonconventional sources, such as coal and was incorporating Anglo American's Monash Energy Project into the alliance.The burning of synthesis gas generated by the gasification of coal emitted significantly lower quantities of greenhouse gases and pollutants than traditional coal burning and was seen by many as the cleanest way to harness the energy potential of coal, which was still the world's dominant fuel source.They aimed to take selective equity positions in coal-conversion projects in order to maximise the benefits from the emerging field of clean-coal energy.These projects would use Anglo's coal reserves and combine its mining capabilities with Shell's technologies. The objective was to extract, gasify and convert coal into chemicals, hydrogen, power and liquid hydrocarbons.Shell Gas & Power executive director Linda Cook said the alliance further advanced the progress that Shell has made in developing clean coal energy. She described clean coal energy and the potential opportunities that it would unlock as exciting