The company is building a $2.7 billion port, iron ore mine, and rail project in Western Australia with the first shipment in May 2008.

BHP Billiton Ltd., Woodside Petroleum Ltd., and Santos Ltd scaled down oil production by half after the first tropical cyclone of the season hit the northwest coast.

BHP''s spokeswoman, Emma Meade told reporters by phone today that the mining giant had stopped oil and natural gas output at its Stybarrow and Griffin fields yesterday and was reported by Bloomberg.

Woodside''s spokeswoman Kirsten Stoney said they had stopped production at Enfield and Cossack-Pioneer and Santos''s spokesman Matthew Doman said they had shut down Mutineer Exeter field on December 29.

The officials said the shut down equates to more than 260,000 barrels a day of crude and condensate output are mostly set to end today or tomorrow.

A forecaster with the Bureau of Meteorology in Perth said the category two storm on the five-tier ranking system with winds as strong as 120 kilometers an hour is weakening and will be downgraded later today. Most cyclones are prone in the northwest Australian coastline between Broome and Exmouth. Averages of five cyclones strike the region between November and April each year.

Santos gained 0.5%, BHP fell 0.5% and Woodside was down 0.1%.

Australian leading mining companies Rio Tinto and BHP Billiton will be crowned the top performers of the year on the London Stock Exchange when trading closes for 2007.

Rio Tinto and BHP are two leading gainers in the FTSE 100 share index. Rio closed up a whopping 90% and BHP gained 69% for the year.

The dollar closed stronger on the last trading day of 2007, breaking through $0.8800 on strong private sector credit data and weak US new home sales in November. At the close the dollar was at $0.8818 up from Friday''s close of $0.8726.

Of the ASX 200 index shares, Allco Finance led the gainers with a rise of 7.6% followed by increases in Lynas Corp Limited of 6%, in Bunnings Warehouse of 4.9%, in Sino Gold Mining of 4.7%, and in Babcock & Brown of 4.6%.

Of the ASX 200 index stocks Fortescue Metals led the decliners with a fall of 11.5% followed by losses in Centro Retail Group of 6.4%, in Australand Properties of 4.1%, in James Hardie of 3.3%, and in PMP Limited of 4.3%.

In other stocks the banking sector was mixed, with Westpac gaining 0.1%, Commonwealth Bank of Australia up 0.4% and Australia and New Zealand shed 0.2%. The retailers were mixed, with David Jones adding 0.5%, Harvey Norman up 1.3% and Wesfarmers shed 0.6%.

The media sector was also mixed, with Fairfax was up 1.1%, News Corp lost 0.8% and Consolidated Media Holdings declined 1.8%.

Shares in Lincoln Minerals fell 5.26% on news it had concluded a joint venture agreement with India''s Mineral Enterprises.