Raspadskaya Coal Company (Raspadskaya), the second largest coking coal producer in Russia, has announced that, within the program to restore production at its Raspadskaya mine, the company's total monthly production volume of semi‐hard and hard coking coal (in raw coal) exceeded 600,000 mt in January 2011 - the first time it has done so since the May 2010 accident.
As SteelOrbis previously reported, in 2010, before the accident, the aggregate production volumes of semi-hard coking coal at Raspadskaya's three enterprises (Raspadskaya mine, MUK-96 mine, Razrez Raspadsky open-pit) amounted to about 950,000 mt per month and coal concentrate sales volumes amounted to about 760,000 mt per month, with around 65 percent of sales going to Russian clients and 35 percent to exports.
On December 16, 2010, Raspadskaya announced the commencement of production operations at face 4‐9‐21 bis (seam No. 9), the first face to be recommissioned at its Raspadskaya mine after the accident. As Raspadskaya's CEO Gennady Kozovoy commented, in 2011 the company aims to recommence production at all seams of the Raspadskaya mine.