Bayan Starts Production At World's Largest Clean Coal Facility

PT Bayan Resources, Tbk. announced that their joint venture company PT Kaltim Supacoal (KSC) has started producing upgraded clean coal briquettes at KSC’s 1 million tons per annum Binderless Coal Briquetting plant (BCB Plant) in Tabang, Indonesia.

According to a press release, sent to Majalah TAMBANG on 25 August 2009, the commissioning process has been completed the day before. As scheduled, the plant operators ran all components of the BCB Plant under temporary conditions, from the raw coal feeder breaker, to the drying column, to multiple briquetting units, and finally to the product out-loading bin. With all process operated to specification, the BCB plant has successfully produced its first run of upgraded coal.

With the completion of the commissioning process, PT Kaltim Supacoal would now move to the next phase of operating the BCB plant under temporary power on a continuous 24 hours basis for a number of days.

The commissioning process has actually been conducted for the last couple of months, involving a simultaneous commissioning of the BCB Plant and a 10 MW coal-fired Power Station.

For the coal-fired power station, the commissioning process has almost completed. Final integration with the BCB Plant was expected to be ready in the next few weeks.

At that point, the coal upgrading facility would be able to run at enhanced levels allowing for ramp up to full production. Bayan was optimistic that the optimum production capacity could be reached over the next few months.