Newcastle Coal Exports Rise 22%; Queue of Ships at 1-Year High

By Dinakar Sethuraman

Dec. 22 (Bloomberg) -- Coal exports from Australia's Newcastle, the world's biggest export harbor for the fuel, climbed 22 percent last week while the number of ships waiting outside the port was the highest in a year.

The volume shipped in the week ended 7 a.m. local time yesterday rose to 2.09 million metric tons from 1.71 million tons a week earlier, Newcastle Port Corp. said today on its Web site. A total of 45 ships, waiting to load 3.84 million tons of coal, were lined up outside the port, unchanged from last week. Read more...

Developer unveils coal-to-gas refinery for W.Va.

By TIM HUBER , 12.09.08, 02:59 PM EST

A New York electric power plant developer with a mixed track record announced plans Tuesday to build a $3 billion coal-to-liquids plant capable of refining an estimated 6.5 million barrels of gasoline annually in West Virginia.

TransGas Development Systems hopes to obtain a state air quality permit so it can begin construction by 2010 and start operations by 2013. The company is proposing to build the plant on an 800-acre site in the state's southern coalfields leased from the Mingo County Development Authority. Read more...