Ensham Coal Mine

This article is part of the Global Coal Mine Tracker, a project of Global Energy Monitor.

Download full dataset

Report an error

Sub-articles:

Global coal mines Coal mines in China Coal mines in India Coal mines in the United States Coal mines in Australia Coal mines in Russia Coal mines in Indonesia

Related-articles:

Largest coal mines in the world Coal mine impacts from Covid-19 Environmental issues of coal Coal mining Coal reserves Coal terminals

Ensham Coal Mine is an operating coal mine in Emerald, Queensland, Australia.

Location

Table 1: Project-level location details

Mine Name	Location	Coordinates (WGS 84)
Ensham Coal Mine	Emerald, Queensland, Australia	-23.454464, 148.497455 (exact)

The map below shows the exact location of the coal mine:

Project Details

Table 2: Project status

Status	Status Detail	Opening Year	Closing Year
Operating	–	1993	2037 (planned)

Table 3: Operation details

Capacity (Mtpa)	Production (Mtpa)	Year of Production	Mine Type	Mining Method	Mine Size (km2)	Mine Depth (m)	Workforce Size
6.25	3.944	2025	Underground & Surface	Mixed	27.37	210.0	603.0

Table 4: Coal resources and destination

Total Reserves (Mt)	Year of Total Reserves Recorded	Total Resources (Mt)	Coalfield	Coal Type	Coal Grade	Primary Consumer/ Destination
67.0	2025	1036.0	Bowen	Subbituminous	Thermal	Terminal (Export)

Table 5: Ownership and parent company

Note: To access more comprehensive data on energy ownership, please visit the Global Energy Ownership Tracker.

Owner	Parent Company	Headquarters
Sungela	Thungela Resources Australia Pty Ltd	Australia, South Korea

Table 6: Historical production (unit: million tonnes per annum)

ROM or Saleable	2017	2018	2019	2020	2021	2022	2023	2024	2025
Saleable	4.98	5.26	5.27	5.01	4.12	3.91	2.94	–	3.94

Reported Methane Emissions Data

Global Energy Monitor collates facility-scale methane emissions data reported by government and company sources collected in a systematic fashion. This mine is associated with the following methane emissions reports:

Table 7: Methane emissions

Reported Coal Mine Methane Emissions (thousand tonnes CO2 equivalent)	Reported Coal Mine Methane Emissions (thousand tonnes CH4)	Year of Reported Coal Mine Methane Emissions	Reported Coal Mine Methane Emissions (thousand tonnes) Reference	Reference type
8.187	679.542	2024-25	​	national government data

Note: The above sections were automatically generated and are based on data from the Global Coal Mine Tracker May 2026 release.

Ownership Tree

This ownership tree is part of the Global Energy Ownership Tracker, a project of Global Energy Monitor.

Background

The Ensham mine is an open-cut and underground coal mine located near Emerald, Queensland, Australia.

In February 2023, previous owner Idemitsu Australia, sold its stake in the Ensham coal mine to Sungela Pty Ltd — a consortium of Thungela Resources Limited (75%), Mayfair Corporations Group Pty Ltd (12.5%) and Audley Energy Limited (12.5%). The mine is a joint venture of Sungela and Bowen Investment (Australia), with Sungela holding the majority of shares. Open cut mining began at Ensham in 1993, and in 2011, the operation began underground mining as well. Historically, the mine has produced great quantities of coal per year — as of 2009, the mine had produced over 80 million tonnes of coal. By some estimations, over a billion tonnes in total resource still remain at the Ensham mine. However, an estimate of the mine’s recoverable reserves was not available.

Throughout the mine’s history, annual production has varied between 8 million tonnes of coal per year and 5 million tonnes of coal per year. Before the early 2010s, production was higher, but falling coal prices caused the company to downsize its operations.

In February 2007, an expansion of the existing Ensham open-cut coal mine (aka, the "Ensham Central Project") was approved by the Queensland Government.

According to an ABC News report, mining is scheduled to take place at Ensham mine until 2028. The report also points out that Ensham Mine was one of the first large open-cut mines subject to new legislation that requires miners to rehabilitate land progressively as they mine.

The coal is transported from the stockpiles using large road trains to the coal plant where it is crushed and screened for size and then transported via rail to Gladstone Port for shipping and to Gladstone Power Station for domestic electricity generation.

• Operator: Sungela Pty Ltd.
• Owners: Sungela Pty Ltd (85%), Bowen Investment (Australia) Pty Ltd (15%)
• Location: 40 km north-east of Emerald, Queensland, Australia
• GPS Coordinates: -23.454464, 148.497455 (exact)
• Status: Operating
• Production: 2.91 mtpa (2022)
• Total Resource: 1,477 million tonnes (as of 2003)
• Mineable Reserves: 724 million tonnes
• Coal Type: Thermal coal
• Mine Size:
• Mine Type: Open cut (dragline operation) & underground (bord and pillar operation)
• Start Year: 1993
• Source of Financing:

Extension

In 2021, Ensham proposed to increase the life of its existing underground operations by extending the underground bord and pillar mine into a 2,737 hectare-area located approximately 200 kilometers west of Rockhampton and 35 km east of Emerald. The project, known as the Ensham Life of Mine Extension Project, would extend the life of Ensham Mine's underground operations by up to nine years (that is, to approximately 2037), with underground decommissioning/rehabilitation expected to be completed by 2039.

As of July 2023, the Queensland Government has approved this extension.

Coal Mine Boundaries and Methane Sources

Global Energy Monitor researchers have identified coal mine boundary/boundaries and potential sources of coal mine methane (CMM) for this mine. These research results can be used to drive CMM attribution and mitigation efforts, particularly when combined with remotely sensed methane plume locations and mine ownership data. Explore the results with the embedded map at the top of this page by clicking on the mine boundary polygon or the CMM placemarkers to reveal more details. A detailed description of this research can be found in Coal Mine Boundaries and Methane Sources. This data is also available as a downloadable companion dataset to the Global Coal Mine Tracker and the Global Methane Emitters Tracker.

Table SMP1: Coal mine boundaries and methane sources data

ID	Mine feature category	Mine feature subcategory	Description	Coordinates precision	Data source date
M0038.B1	mine boundary	underground and surface	Ensham mine boundary	extracted	2024-12-23 00:00:00
M0038.P1	ventilation system	vent	ventilation system	extracted	2023-04-13 00:00:00
M0038.P2	ventilation system	vent	ventilation system	extracted	2023-04-13 00:00:00
M0038.P3	degasification system	flare	flare	extracted	2023-04-13 00:00:00
M0038.P4	degasification system	flare	flare	extracted	2023-04-13 00:00:00
M0038.P5	degasification system	drainage station	possible gas drainage infrastructure	extracted	2023-04-13 00:00:00
M0038.P6	other	mine entrance or exit	possible mine entrance/exit	extracted	2023-04-13 00:00:00
M0038.P7	other	slope access or production shaft	possible mine production shaft	extracted	2023-04-13 00:00:00

Table SMP2: Coal mine boundaries and methane sources data (continued)

Coal mine boundaries and methane sources were last researched for this mine on Sep 08, 2025

ID	Notes
M0038.B1	Figure 1 Proposed project area (from EIS Figure 4-1 Underground mine plan) on page 14 of the Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) assessment report under the Environmental Protection Act 1994 Ensham Life of Mine Extension Proposed by Ensham Joint Venture November 2021, https://web.archive.org/web/2/https://www.qld.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0025/220948/ensham-life-of-mine-extension-project-assessment-report.pdf, shows the mining leases and proposed extension area. Mining leases were found in the Queensland Mining Leases dataset (https://web.archive.org/web/2/https://www.data.qld.gov.au/dataset/queensland-mining-and-exploration-tenure-series/resource/f87794b8-7b9a-4732-89bb-56ccb2228d27) that very closely match Figure 4-1 and are presumed to be more recent than in the 2021 EIS report. The extracted boundary includes mining leases ML 700061, 70049, 70326, 70365, 70366, 70367, 7459 and 7460. Underground operations are shown in Figure 4 on page 41 and predominantly located in ML 700061 and 70365, west of the central and southern pits. The area of the boundary is 148 sq km.
M0038.P1	Visually identified with Google Earth Pro satellite imagery.
M0038.P2	Visually identified with Google Earth Pro satellite imagery.
M0038.P3	Visually identified with Google Earth Pro satellite imagery.
M0038.P4	Visually identified with Google Earth Pro satellite imagery.
M0038.P5	Visually identified with Google Earth Pro satellite imagery.
M0038.P6	Visually identified with Google Earth Pro satellite imagery.
M0038.P7	Visually identified with Google Earth Pro satellite imagery.

Articles and Resources

Additional data

To access additional data, including an interactive map of world coal mines, a downloadable dataset, and summary data, please visit the Global Coal Mine Tracker on the Global Energy Monitor website.