Company awarded prestigious accolade by industry peers at IHS McCloskey UK Coal conference
BANKS Mining, part of the Banks Group, have been named by their peers as the best in the business.
The company was presented with the Surface Miner Of The Year award at the annual IHS McCloskey Coal UK conference in London – an award which is voted for by surface mining firms across the UK, as well as by their customers and suppliers.
The award recognizes excellence in every aspect of a surface mining company’s operations, from business achievements and operational efficiency through to environmental performance and effective site management.
Banks’ commitment to positive, effective interaction with the communities around their operational sites, and the way in which the company works to ensure that tangible benefits result from its presence in an area, was especially noted as being a prime example for the industry to follow.
Banks Mining employ more than 200 people and have operated more than 100 surface mining sites across north-east England, Yorkshire, the Midlands and Scotland over the last three decades.
They currently operate the Shotton surface mine in south-east Northumberland and the Brenkley Lane surface mine in Newcastle, and have just begun preparatory operations at their new Rusha site in West Lothian, Scotland, where around 50 new jobs will be created over the next six months.
Banks expect to submit a planning application for their proposed Ferneybeds surface mine near Widdrington Station, to the north of Ashington, in Northumberland later this year, and are also responsible for the creation of Northumberlandia, the world’s largest human landform sculpture, which will form the centrepiece of a new public park being built on land on the county’s Blagdon Estate.
This is the second award that Banks have won already this year, after landscape management work carried out at the former Moss Carr surface mine site, to the east of Leeds, was named as the winner of the Landscape category at the Leeds Architectural Awards.
Gavin Styles (pictured holding the award), executive director at Banks Mining, said: ‘This is a fantastic achievement and one that reflects the commitment and dedication of every member of the team, from those that initially identify potential site locations and develop our planning applications, through to those that shape, work and then restore the sites that we operate.
‘The recognition given to the community aspects of our operations is especially gratifying – we’ve long recognized that involving all relevant parties in the development and operation of surface mine sites is the best way to ensure that they run as smoothly as possible, and we’re very proud of the record that we’ve built in this area.’
