Coal giant Peabody details global jobs cull

Peabody's latest quarterly report has outlined cost cutting measures across its Australian and United States operations in the face of reduced coal demand and pricing. Over the past 18 months, Peabody has reduced its workforce by about 24 per cent. This includes 450 jobs shed since April, including contractors, across several mines - taking the total cuts across operations and corporate and support functions to approximately 1020 positions. The company has restructured the Coppabella and Moorvale operations in the Bowen Basin to operate as a single mining complex. It said this was anticipated to result in increased efficiencies and lower costs. In addition, the mine reduced three excavators/truck and shovel units in response to challenging PCI demand. At the Metropolitan mine in New South Wales, the company said it had cut about 34 per cent of its workforce, including contractors, and scaled back production in response to weak seaborne demand. In addition, Peabody furloughed approximately 280 positions, including contractors, at its Wambo Underground Mine (NSW) beginning in mid-June (at the conclusion of its recent longwall move) for 59 days. The company also furloughed employees during at an extended longwall move at Twentymile and shortened work schedules at several other U.S. thermal coal mines. "While work is still underway, since initiation of the program, 10 out of 17 currently owned and operated mines have demonstrated improvements in cost per ton when comparing second quarter 2020 results to full-year 2019 results, despite significant volume declines," the company reported. Peabody's Queensland mines are Coppabella, Middlemount, Moorvale and North Goonyella (closed after a fire in 2018). It also holds the Metropolitan, Wilpinjong and Wambo mines in NSW, as well as multiple coal mines across the United States. The company overnight announced its second quarter 2020 operating results, including revenues of $626.7 million; loss from continuing operations, net of income taxes of $1.55 billion; net loss attributable to common stockholders of $1.54 billion; and adjusted EBITDA of $23.4 million. Peabody noted that ongoing demand uncertainty driven by idled steel capacity in Europe and the Asia-Pacific, weak overall electricity generation and the implementation of Chinese import restrictions had contributed to low seaborne coal prices. "Over the past quarter, we have remained committed to the health and safety of our employees and communities in which we operate, while also taking further action to improve our cost structure," president and chief executive officer Glenn Kellow said. "Our U.S. thermal operations have done a tremendous job of adapting to significantly lower demand, while our seaborne operations have remained pressured by the economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. "Continued uncertainty in global markets requires us to further improve our operating performance and ensure we have a scalable structure that can respond to market conditions in the months ahead." Peabody reported a 48 per cent decline in seaborne metallurgical coal shipments for the quarter, saying they were significantly impacted by demand and production constraints. Disruptions to production at its Bowen Basin operations included pit sequencing at Moorvale and a planned dragline outage at Coppabella. .

Coal giant Peabody details global jobs cull

Industry Queensland

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