Macarthur Coal cuts production to fit Dalrymple Bay queue system

<p>Macarthur Coal has been forced to cut production as a result of limited loading allocations stemming from the Dalrymple Bay Coal Terminal queue management system.</p> <p>Macarthur Coal’s vice president of strategy, Shane Stephen, said the miner would export only 4.5m tonnes this year, compared with 5m tonnes last year.</p> <p>The queue management system allocates companies a set amount they can export each month.</p> <p>The system is triggered when the demand for DBCT’s ship loading services exceeds the capacity of the coal supply chain.</p> <p>The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission last month authorised the continuation of the queue management system for coal vessels.</p> <p>ACCC chairman Graeme Samuel said the queue has also reduced from a peak of over 50 ships to a desirable operating level of about 15 ships. </p> <p>The queue system was to address an imbalance between the amount of coal that producers wanted to export and the capacity of the Goonyella coal supply chain and the terminal.</p> <br />