Mining giant Xstrata announced they will be opening the Donkin coal mine 20 years after it was initially dug. Officials announced the decision to Donkin N.S. residents in a packed fire hall earlier this week. The news comes as a relief to local residents who say that jobs are desperately needed in the region.

Work on the Donkin NS mine began in the 1980’s when Devco, a former crown corporation, dug a serried of tunnels 3 miles below the earth’s surface to extract coal form the area. The company initially spent $100 million on the project, but it was abandoned due to the falling price of coal.

Xstrata has spent more than $20 million investigating the tunnels by pumping out water and analyzing the coal. According to Jeff Gerard, chief development officer of Xstrata’s coal division, there is enough marketable resources in the mine to operate effectively and create 200 new jobs in the region.

"It'll be at a slightly smaller scale," he said. "What we're looking at doing is progressively building a continuous miner operation that will produce around about 2.75 million tonnes per annum."

More than $300 million dollars will be invested into the Donkin mine which is expected to operate at least for the next 25 years. The coal produced from the mine is slated to be exported internationally.

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