Australia's Newcastle coal exportsjump 25 pct
SINGAPORE, April 16 (Reuters) - Coal exports from Newcastle port jumped by 25 percent to a two and half month high over the past week, despite record queues and longer waiting times, a port official said on Monday.
The world's biggest coal export terminal shipped 1.828 million tonnes of coal over the week, up from 1.464 million the previous week, and the highest since the end of January, Newcastle Port Corporation (NPC) data showed.
Vessel queues at the port rose by a single vessel to a fresh record high of 72 ships. The average waiting time last week at the port also rose by nearly a day to a fresh high of 27.85 days.
The backlog is expected to return to acceptable levels by the end of June 2007, under the capacity balancing system which received initial approval in late February.
The delays, caused by infrastructure constraints and maintenance work, have hurt exports of coal just as demand soars on world markets. Australia is the world's largest producer of thermal coal.
Australia's New South Wales state government has approved plans for a new coal export terminal at the Newcastle port, planned to start operations in 2009 and that will add nearly two-thirds to the port's capacity [nSYD227082]. Coal stocks on hand at the Carrington and Kooragang berths rose to 912,385 tonnes, up 21,563 tonnes, the NPC data showed.
Newcastle coal export details in tonnes, unless noted: SHIPPED FULL-MTH EST ARR. WAITING TIME COAL STORE WEEK TO 1.828 mln.T 7.750 mln.T 17 27.85 days 912,385 Apr.16 1.464 mln.T 7.750 mln.T 19 27.00 days 890,822 Apr.09 1.049 mln.T 7.750 mln.T 12 26.05 days 775,568 Apr.02 1.705 mln.T 7.100 mln.T 16 24.02 days 572,326 Mar.26 1.659 mln.T 7.100 mln.T 20 22.18 days 569,069 Mar.19 1.785 mln.T 7.100 mln.T 20 22.51 days 958,000 Mar.12 1.567 mln.T 7.100 mln.T 21 21.10 days 1,071,000 Mar.05 1.669 mln.T 6.600 mln.T 18 18.78 days 1,016,000 Feb.26 1.534 mln.T 6.600 mln.T 18 19.20 days 896,375 Feb.19 1.702 mln.T 6.600 mln.T 18 19.00 days 662,823 Feb.12 1.656 mln.T 6.600 mln.T 19 19.94 days 755,032 Feb.05
((Reporting by Jonathan Nonis; editing by Neil Chatterjee; Reuters Messaging: jonathan.nonis.reuters.net@reuters.com; +65 6870 3958)) Keywords: AUSTRALIA COAL/NEWCASTLE
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