Whitehaven Coal has upgraded the resource for its Winchester South metallurgical coal project to more than one billion tonnes, with the planned mine now expected to have a throughput of up to 15Mtpa over more than 20 years.

The project, about 30km south-west of Moranbah, is expected to cost $980 million to bring online.

The company this month submitted the draft Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) as Winchester South continues to progress through the Queensland Government’s Coordinated Project approval process.

Whitehaven Coal managing director and chief executive officer Paul Flynn said the declaration of the maiden reserves and updated resource for Winchester South was an important milestone for the project.

The JORC resource is upgraded to 1100Mt from 530Mt, and includes 665Mt of measured and indicated resources, while the maiden reserves are 350MT.

This represents a 12 per cent increase in total Whitehaven Coal resources since August 2020 and a 26 per cent lift in its reserves.

Whitehaven Coal took control of the former Rio Tinto project in 2018 and has since drilled more than 200 holes specifically targeting additional metallurgical coal definition.

Winchester South will be primarily a metallurgical coal mine producing a blend of coking and thermal coal for export to established and emerging markets in Asia.

The project is surrounded by active coal mining and exploration areas including the Peak Downs mine to the south-west, Eagle Downs to the west, Poitrel and Daunia Mines to the north and the Olive Downs South to the south-east.

The Norwich Park branch railway line crosses the northern part of the project and directly connects to multiple coal export terminals.

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