Adani hires consulting firm for $6.2 bn Australia coal project

Consulting firm Parsons Brinckerhoff to provide contract reviews as firm looks to start production by end of 2017

Adani Enterprises has hired consulting firm Parsons Brinckerhoff to manage contract reviews for its long-delayed A$7 billion ($6.2 billion) coal mine, rail and port project as it looks to start production by the end of 2017.

Adani said on Wednesday the consultant would provide quality control and audit services for engineering, procurement and construction contracts, in the latest sign Adani is trying to push ahead with a mine it originally aimed to open this year.

With coal prices at five-year lows and up to a third of all Australian production running at a loss, much bigger companies than Adani, like BHP Billiton and Glencore, have shelved new coal projects in Australia.

Adani earlier this year lined up South Korea's Posco Engineering & Construction Co Ltd to build the rail line for the Carmichael mine and bought out royalty rights on the coal from Linc Energy.

"We are well placed to commence construction in the first quarter of 2015 in line with our guidance of first coal in 2017," Adani Mining Chief Executive Jeyakumar Janakaraj said in a statement. Adani Mining is a unit of Adani Enterprises.

The project still needs a mining license, landowner agreements along the rail route, and approval for a revised port expansion plan that calls for dredge waste to be dumped on land instead of near the Great Barrier Reef.

($1 = 1.1289 Australian dollar)