Benzinga | Aug 11, 2020 08:34AM EDT

American Resources Corporation Acquires Two Additional Continuous Miners For Perry County Resources

Company preparing to restart metallurgical carbon mining and processing operations at restructured complex

Perry County Resources restructured to be one of the lowest cost and most innovative PCI (pulverized coal injection) and stoker operations in the United States

FISHERS, IN / ACCESSWIRE / August 11, 2020 / American Resources Corporation (NASDAQ:AREC) ("American Resources" or the "Company"), a supplier of raw materials to the rapidly growing global infrastructure marketplace, announced today that the Company has signed a contract to acquire two additional continuous miners for their Perry County Resources ("PCR") mining complex in Hazard, Kentucky.

The PCR complex was acquired in September 2019 and has undergone a major restructuring. In anticipation of restarting the PCR complex within the next thirty days, American Resources is expanding its fleet of continuous miners to fit its restructured and low-cost operating model. With the addition of the two continuous miners the Company will now have six continuous miners as it restarts and ramps production.

Mark Jensen, Chairman and CEO of American Resources Corporation commented, "We are truly excited to restart the Perry County complex and unveil it as one of the lowest cost, if not the lowest, PCI and stoker operations in the United States. We applaud our team for the tremendous achievements made over the last several months to reduce over $45 million of costs and implement our strategic plan moving forward. Since acquiring it out of bankruptcy, we have invested a significant amount of time and resources into the complex to return it back into an efficient and productive operation. Now with six continuous miners, up from the one continuous miner that was operational when we acquired PCR, we feel we are in a really good position to ramp up the complex very efficiently and look forward to doing so in the near future."

Over the next twelve months, American Resources anticipates ramping up carbon production at PCR to have five continuous miners in operation with two "super" sections and one bridge section, allowing the mine to scale with maximum efficiency. The Company also anticipates adding additional continuous miners to the fleet at PCR to have a high degree of redundancy to minimize any unexpected equipment down-time. Additionally, the Company is anticipating through its forecasted production schedule to ramp the PCR complex to over 1.0 million tons of carbon per year to be shipped on the PCI, semi-soft metallurgical carbon and specialty stoker markets.

American Resources has been a consolidator and operator of quality metallurgical carbon assets in the Central Appalachian basin ("CAPP") to serve customers in the steelmaking, specialty alloy metals, and industrial marketplaces. Its next-generation model and philosophy is to restructure existing, legacy operations to better fit the modern-day marketplace by eliminating legacy costs and liabilities to significantly increase the overall efficiency and profitability of its complexes. Perry County Resources is one of the Company's five operating complexes within the CAPP.

Production at PCR has been idle during the COVID-19 outbreak to ensure a safe working environment, to protect the health of its employees and others, to mitigate the spread of the virus, and to better navigate the global economic disruption. With its restart, American Resources expects the complex to support approximately 140 long-term, sustainable jobs for the community.