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The truth about lignite
At the Southern Field Days at Waimumu, in February 2012, Solid Energy ran tours to the New Vale lignite mine, as part of explaining the company's ligntie development and related plans. New Vale's chief customers are Invercargill Hospital, Dunedin Hospital, and Fonterra's dairy processing plant at Edendale, Southland.
More about New Vale in pictures ...
The pasture to the shelterbelt was once a lignite mine. Today the area is returned to farmland after rehabilitation of mine workings.
Looking in the opposite direction to the current open pit. The seam of lignite is clearly visible beneath several metres of overburden.
A digger loads overburden into trucks for temporary storage. As coal is progrssively removed, waste rock is returned, and the land is rehabilitated into farmland. When mining comes to an end, a large pond and wetland will remain, having irrigation and amenity value, as part of Solid Energy's resource consents.
The future of lignite
Solid Energy is exploring two main uses for lignite conversion: to briquettes, for industrial and home heating; and to urea, for fertiliser, in a project with Ravensdown. The conversion to diesel project is a long-term plan. More information here
At the Southern Field Days, Solid Energy's process engineer for the lignite-to-briquettes plant discusses the project with locals. Up to 100,000 tonnes of lignite a year will have most of the embodied water squeezed out of it, at a small plant, expected to begin operations in July 2012, in Mataura.
Biodiesel New Zealand is a subsidiary of Solid Energy, and is one of a number of renewable energy projects being developed by this company. For information on Nature's Flame