China Power International Development Ltd. (CPI), a unit of major power producer China Power Investment Corp., Monday denied media reports that it had signed a 60-billion U.S. dollar coal-supply deal with Australia's mining firm Resourcehouse.

What the two companies had signed was an agreement of intent, and they had not yet started price negotiations, an official from China Power International Development told Xinhua.

Resourcehouse, the Australian coal and iron-ore project developer planning a Hong Kong listing next month, claimed on Saturday that it had signed the massive deal with CPI, according to which Resourcehouse would supply 30 million tonnes of coal annually to CPI over next 20 years.

The CPI official, who did not want to be named, said the sum of 60 billion U.S. dollars was an estimation by Resourcehouse, which was revealed by the Australian company probably for its own benefits.

Resourcehouse chairman Clive Palmer reportedly said the coal of the "Australia's biggest ever export contract" would come from a coal mine project in Queensland known as China First, which was to be built by Metallurgical Corporation of China Limited, one of the world's biggest engineering contractors.

The China First project, costing 7 billion dollars, would be constructed this year and become operational in 2013.

Currently 70 percent of China's primary energy generation comes from coal. China imported 43.9 million tonnes of coal from Australia in 2009, which made it the largest coal exporter to China, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.

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