1.1.3.4 Coal and hydrocarbons

1.1.3.4.1 Coal

Early attempts were made to mine coal on a small scale at Gloucester and Dewrang, but the steep dips of the seams at these localities, the numerous minor folds and faults, and the high watertable made mining initially hazardous and uneconomical (Loughnan, 1954). Renewed exploration by various companies in the 1980s delineated economic coking and thermal coal deposits in the region in the Stratford area (Harrington et al., 1989) between Weismantels and Stroud Road.

Coal seams in the Gloucester Basin are characterised by considerable lateral splitting, with only six of the 20 or more seams correlated across the syncline from the western and eastern halves of the basin (Pells Consulting, 2012, p. 12). Coal seams are present within the three main Permian stratigraphic groups of the Gloucester Basin:

  • The Alum Mountain Volcanics include two coals seams, despite earlier work suggesting that it is barren of coal (AECOM, 2009, p. 14–24).
  • The Dewrang Group includes two coals seams that are the coal resource of the Duralie Coal Mine in the southern closure of the main basin synclinal structure (Merrick, 2009, p. B–8).
  • The Gloucester Coal Measures are considered to be equivalent to the Late Permian Wittingham Coal Measures of the Hunter Coalfield, northern Sydney Basin (Roberts et al., 1991, p. 324). The coals in the Gloucester Coal Measures are generally vitrain rich and intensely cleated which would suggest good permeability and significant potential for coal seam gas resources (Brown et al., 1996, p. 55). The Stratford and Bowen Road open-cut operations extract coal from upper and middle seams of the Gloucester Coal Measures.

1.1.3.4.2 Hydrocarbons

No conventional hydrocarbons are produced from the Gloucester Basin.

To date the basin is an area of significant interest for coal seam gas exploration (Weber and Bocking, 1995) and an area on the eastern limb of the basin’s main syncline near Stratford is currently being investigated in detail for coal seam gas production.

Last updated:
5 January 2018