Jiangsu Tiandeli Intelligent Technology Co will construct a comprehensive disposal and utilization plant to treat coal gangue in Yangquan city in northern Shanxi province, according to an agreement recently signed between Yangquan energy bureau and the Jiangsu province-headquartered company.

Yangquan is a typical resource-based city and an old industrial base of Shanxi province. After decades of coal mining, there are 148 gangue mounds littering the city, with an estimated stockpile of about 300 million metric tons and the stockpile is increasing at a rate of 17 million tons per year.

Turning coal gangue from waste into a resource and promoting coal gangue utilization have been a major task for the city in its energy revolution and industrial transformation.

Officials said the new project will use low-temperature anaerobic cracking technology to comprehensively process the coal gangue in Yangquan.

They said the process will avoid environmental pollution caused by landfill and the open-air stacking of a large number of coal gangues. Tar, clinker and combustible gas from coal gangue processing can be utilized in other industries.

Officials said the first phase of the project will cost an investment of 360 million yuan ($51.67 million) and the daily coal gangue processing capacity will reach 1,000 tons.