New Hope Group's rehabilitation program and scientific cattle grazing trials at its New Acland Coal Mine have been selected as a finalist for Excellence in Environmental Management at this year's Australian Mining Prospect Awards.
The rehabilitation, run by New Hope's Acland Pastoral Company (ACP), is progressive and occurs right behind the mining activities. Because of this the footprint of the actual mining pit at New Acland is (has been) no greater than 175 hectares (approx.) at any one time.
The grazing trials are a part of a five-year study conducted by independent industry experts including pasture agronomists, soil scientists, a veterinarian and an independent statistician to compare the production performance of cattle grazing on rehabilitated mined land with cattle grazing on non-mined land.
The first stage of the trials indicated that the weight gain of cattle on the rehabilitated land was better than the cattle that grazed on non-mined land.
The second stage of the project has been developed to determine viability, safety and sustainability of beef production on rehabilitated land and will also investigate the structure of rehabilitated soils compared to unmined soils.