Australian firm signs deal to export coal to Viet Nam

Australia’s Environmental Clean Technologies (ETC) has signed a multi-million dollar trade and investment deal with Viet Nam’s Thang Long Investment and Commercial Joint Stock Company (TinCom) to export processed brown coal to Viet Nam.

According to the Melbourne-based technology company, the deal enables ECT and TinCom, through their joint venture company Victoria Coldry Pty Ltd (VCPL), to export 2 million tonnes of Coldry pellets a year from early 2014, expanding up to 20 million tonnes a year in its first decade of operations.

Under the agreement, ETC will provide a licence for its technology to enable brown coal to be transformed into environmentally cleaner black coal equivalent pellets. At the same time, TinCom will provide up to US$100 million in first stage equity finance, representing one of the largest investments by Viet Nam in Australia.

ECT and its Vietnamese partner plan to build a processing plant in the Australian state of Victoria’s Latrobe Valley. The Coldry plant is expected to be fully operational by late 2013 or early 2014.

The deal was formalised last Friday as part of a visit to Australia by Viet Nam’s Minister of Planning and Investment Vo Hong Phuc to co-chair the 9th Australia-Viet Nam Joint Trade and Economic Co-operation Committee (JTECC) with Australia’s Trade Minister Simon Crean in Melbourne.

“It is about Australian technology being used to deliver a more environmentally sensitive energy solution for the people of Viet Nam – a small but important contribution to the global effort to reduce carbon emissions,” Trade Minister Crean said last Friday.

“Viet Nam is buying Australian resources but also, equally importantly, investing in the Australian technology to lower the carbon footprint,” he added.

According to the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, two-way trade value between Australia and Viet Nam in 2009 amounted to A$6 billion. — VNS

Tags: Vietnam Coal, Vietnam Coal imports