May 27, 2026 - Clinch Resources (TSX:CLCH) has acquired and delivered its first Caterpillar HW 300 Highwall Miner to its Lanes Branch surface operation in West Virginia, with a second unit scheduled for delivery in the coming months.

The highwall miner will be deployed across the company's ARI project in southern West Virginia, targeting metallurgical coal resources that would otherwise be uneconomic to recover through conventional methods.

Each unit is targeted to produce approximately 180,000 clean tons of met coal per year once fully operational, at a cash cost of less than $60 per clean ton.

Highwall mining is a surface-based extraction method that recovers coal from exposed seam faces without requiring underground access.

Clinch CEO Jon Nix told shareholders that the acquisition is a "meaningful step” in building out its operational platform at ARI.

“These units allow us to efficiently access high-quality coking coal reserves across our 54,000-acre footprint that are ideally suited to highwall mining techniques,” Nix said in a statement. “With one unit, and a second in the coming months, we are adding a low-capital, high-return production stream that strengthens our overall volume profile and reinforces our path toward becoming a significant low-cost Central Appalachian met coal producer.”

Shares of Clinch Resources were up 2.9% on the TSX following the announcement.

Clinch Resources is a Tennessee-based metallurgical mining company with operations in West Virginia, supplying coking coal to steel-based manufacturing facilities domestically and for export.

The firm went public on the TSX in March 2016 and started producing coal from Lanes Branch earlier this month.