It is reported that United States energy giant Peabody Energy has shown an interest in investing in coal mining in Bangladesh.

As per report, high profile company officials, including director Mr Jack Rogayski, visited the country's lone coal mine Barapukuria in north Bangladesh.

Mr Mohammad Quamruzzaman MD of Barapukuria Coal Mining Company Limited said that "Senior executives of Peabody visited this week and expressed eagerness to invest in coal mining."

He added that Barapukuria's existing contract with a Chinese company will expire in 2011.

Barapukuria has a proven reserve of around 389 million tonnes of coal and the company expects to extract 10% to 20% of the total reserves through underground mining within the next 30 years. The government has so far extracted less than four million tonnes of coal from the mine.

Peabody Energy is the world's largest private sector coal company, with 2010 sales of 246 million tonnes and nearly USD 7 billion in revenues. Its coal products fuel 10% of all US electricity generation and 2% of worldwide electricity.

(Sourced from www.allheadlinenews.com)