For years, two questions have stood in the way of abating ventilation air methane (VAM) at coal mines around the world:
Can the technology destroy methane in airflows as dilute as 0.2%?
And can it be connected to a working mine’s ventilation system without creating material safety risks?
At Aberpergwm Colliery in South Wales, Peak Carbon has answered both. Working with mine owner and operator Energybuild, Peak Carbon designed, built and now operates the world’s first full-scale VAM abatement project to destroy methane at commercial scale, at or below 0.2% concentration. The plant was commissioned in May 2026 and treats 25 m³/s of the mine’s ventilation air.
Safety came first in the design
Connecting any process plant to a mine ventilation shaft introduces potential hazards for the people underground, so Peak Carbon followed a structured functional safety design process from concept onward. Each hazard at the interface between the mine and the plant was identified and assessed, and the safety functions needed to control it were defined and engineered into the system.
The result is a ventilation duct connection with dedicated process safety controls that keep the mine’s ventilation separate from the oxidiser. The plant is designed to the functional safety and coal mining safety standards.
Independently checked, step by step
The design was then checked independently, step by step, before and after the plant began operating. Bureau Veritas has independently audited the project’s safety and performance, as has the United Nations’ International Methane Emissions Observatory (IMEO).
The plant has also become a reference site for the industry. Mine owners and operators, regulators, unions and environmental bodies from Australia, the United States, China and Poland have all visited Aberpergwm to see the technology at work as a potential blueprint for their own operations.
