UNFORESEEN geological problems impacting on production plans for the year ahead have forced owners UK COAL to revise planned output and employment levels at West Yorkshire’s Kellingley Colliery.

The colliery, at Knottingley, currently employs over 700 people - 664 of its own and
57 contractors engaged on specialist tunnelling work - and had planned to produce over two million tonnes of coal this year.

However, an assessment of geological disturbances encountered in two production
areas has led UK COAL to reduce its production target to 1.7 million tonnes due to the loss of planned recoverable reserves. As a consequence, the workforce is to be reduced by up to 180 across the range of management and mining disciplines.

The mining trade unions at Kellingley have been advised of the revised plans. Whilst every effort will be made to achieve the job cuts by voluntary means within the next three months, the need for some compulsory redundancies cannot be ruled out.

Says Chief Executive Gerry Spindler: “The loss of planned production at Kellingley is a great disappointment to the men who work there and to us as we had already contracted for the sale of that production to local electricity generators. However, we have to face up to the reality of the geological situation and plan our operations accordingly. While output and manpower will reduce, Kellingley will remain the second biggest producer within our portfolio of eight deep mines and is a key part of our future mining operation.”
Adds Mr. Spindler: “The job cuts are a direct consequence of the adverse geology we have encountered. We can’t change the geology, but we can change our mining plans to ensure we have a robust and viable Kellingley Colliery moving forward for years to come.

“The challenge now is for everyone at Kellingley to engage in a meaningful process to explore all the feasible and viable alternative mining options that maximise output, for which we have a ready market, and jobs. That process of employee involvement is producing new ideas at other collieries; it can do the same at Kellingley and help secure a healthy future for the mine and its employees.”

While geological problems have affected production at Kellingley in the past, mining plans on two long wall panels have been simultaneously disrupted by a combination of faults (fractures in the strata), dirt bands and poor roof conditions.

The latest previously unforeseen geological faults - around 300 metres from the well charted Eggborough fault which displaces the strata by around 40 metres - range in thickness by up to three metres in the Silkstone seam where workings are concentrated at a depth of over 2,000 feet to the east of the Kellingley shafts. The coal seam itself is around two metres thick.

The faults have been proven by a series of tunnels driven primarily to access the reserves and geotechnical surveys which have resulted in around one million tonnes of coal, previously considered recoverable, being wiped-off the production schedule.

Kellingley Colliery manager Adrian Carley is to join UK Coal’s HQ-based “intervention team” - a SWAT squad selected for their technical skills to help collieries improve their performance and results. Mr. Carley is to be succeeded as manager of Kellingley by Bill Tinsley, one of UK Coal’s most experienced mining engineers and who until recently was Business Manager of the Selby group of collieries. Both men take up their new appointments next week.