Coal Preparation Plant Inaugurated in Mazandaran

Central Alborz Coal Company’s Savadkouh coal preparation plant was inaugurated on Tuesday by deputy minister of industries, mining and trade, Mehdi Karbasian, in the northern Mazandaran Province.

With an investment of 450 billion rials ($11.84 million), the project took four years before becoming operational. It has the capacity to wash 500,000 tons of coal per year.

Coal preparation plant, also known as coal wash or handling plant, is a facility that washes coal of soil and rock, crushes it into chunks and prepares it for transportation to markets. The more advanced and efficient the plant, the more waste material can be removed from the coal, lowering its total ash content and improving its market value.

“Savadkouh coal preparation plant utilizes modern production technologies and is superior in terms of energy consumption and waste production [compared to other plants],” Karbasian was quoted as saying by IRNA.

He added that 70% of the plant’s machinery are domestically manufactured.

According to the governor of Savadkouh County, Abdoljavad Tohidi, the plant’s foreign-made machinery have been imported from the United Kingdom, Italy, Australia, South Africa and China.

Mazandaran Province is home to about 140 million tons of proven coal reserves. Through further explorations, the reserves are expected to rise to 160 million tons.

The province produces more than 200,000 tons of coal per year and feeds 10% of the steel industry’s coal demand.