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A joint development agreement struck between global majors Nel Hydrogen US and General Motors (GM) is expected to speed up the development of green hydrogen technology that is competitive with fossil fuels.

The aim of the agreement is to help accelerate the industrialisation of Nel’s proton exchange membrane (PEM) electrolyser platform, a user of platinum group metals (PGMs), which are hosted overwhelmingly by South Africa.

Both companies are looking to enable more cost competitive sources of renewable hydrogen by combining Nel's deep knowledge of electrolysers with GMs' huge insight into fuel cells, which are also PGM-users.

Nel has promising electrolyser technology for clean hydrogen infrastructure and GMs’ Hydrotec fuel cell intellectual property (IP) can help Nel elevate to greater scale, against the background of the giant US motor company having more than a half century of experience in hydrogen fuel cell propulsion.

PEM electrolysers and fuel cells are based largely on the same principles in that PEM electrolysers use electricity and water to produce hydrogen and oxygen, while fuel cells reverse the process, using hydrogen and oxygen to produce electricity and water. Both are zero-emission processes that are unrivalled climate change mitigators.

The two companies see substantial synergies being unlocked by transferring the fuel cell know-how of GM to Nel’s PEM platform.

“We believe this collaboration will give us a competitive advantage in industrialising the production of our PEM electrolysers and further improving the efficiency of our technology,” Nel CEO Håkon Volldal stated in a media release.

Adding Nel as a strategic collaborator is seen by GM as an important step towards commercialising fuel cell technology.

“Electrolysis is key to creating consistent, clean sources of hydrogen to power fuel cells,” GM executive director Global Hydrotec Charles Freese pointed out.

The next step by Nel will be to industrialise the production of its PEM electrolyser equipment to enable technology advancement, amid commercialisation of higher performance and lower cost Hydrotec hydrogen fuel cell and battery technologies.

This is seen as opening up new revenue potential for GM as freight trucking, aerospace, power generation and locomotive industries turn to it for performance enhancement and emission reduction.

Automated production is regarded as being key to scaling up electrolyser use and driving down electrolyser cost.

Nel will be compensating GM for the development work and IP transfer on an ongoing basis and pay a licence after successful commercialisation dependent on how much of the end product is based on GM technology.

As a dedicated hydrogen company, Nel is delivering solutions to produce, store and distribute hydrogen from renewable energy.

It serves industries, and energy and gas companies with leading hydrogen technology.

Nel has a long history of continual improvement of hydrogen plants, with its hydrogen solutions covering the entire value chain from hydrogen production technologies to manufacturing of hydrogen refuelling stations, and providing fuel cell electric vehicles with the same fast refuelling and long range as conventional vehicles.

GM is focused on advancing an all-electric future that is accessible to all. At the heart of this strategy is the Ultium battery platform, which powers mass-market to high-performance vehicles.

A visit by Mining Weekly to the Venetia Underground Project (VUP) on November 14 provided insight into this major diamond development that is scheduled to achieve occupational readiness and first production next year.

“Hopefully, the first part of the year, all going well. We had a setback recently with some of our visa approval processes, which have caused some challenges, but we’ll overcome them, VUP project director Allan Rodel assured.

Venetia, South Africa’s largest diamond producer, is located about 32 km south of the Limpopo River, not far from the borders of Botswana and Zimbabwe, and about 500 km from Johannesburg.

In 2012, Mining Weekly witnessed the first sod turning of the $2-billion underground extension first sod turning, amid vibrant, ongoing opencast operation.

“The mine, as we speak, is 30 years old this year,” said Rodel of the operation, which has been an absolute gem for De Beers ever since the openpit was launched in 1992.

Scheduled to continue to operate until December, the openpit will then transition to underground, which will extend to 2046. “We know, though, that there is definitely opportunity below current levels,” was Rodel’s comment to visiting media.

The ground-handling facilities include manual and automated load-haul dumpers, manual and automated rock breakers, vertical ore passes, an automated truck-loop, underground crushers, ore and waste conveyors and silos.

The trackless fleet will be maintained underground.

Mining Weekly went down the production shaft and the decline and pit ramp, the first production areas.

The production shaft, with a finished internal diameter of 7 m, will be fitted with two rock winders, each having two 24 t payload skips.

The service shaft, which with a finished internal diameter of 7 m, will provide all the services to the underground workings, with both production and service shafts offering downcast air intakes.

The decline and pit ramp will also serve as an additional air intake and logistics management facility.

Vertical shafts, lateral access tunnels, life-of-mine decline and pit ramp, and related surface, underground and offsite infrastructure make up the VUP’s scope, which provides for the continued mining of two kimberlite orebodies – K01 and K02.

The K01 orebody will be mined using sub-level caving mining to produce four-million tonnes a year (4 Mt/y) to 4.5 Mt/y, averaging 3.5-million carats a year.

Sub-level caving will also be used to mine KO2, producing 1.9 Mt/y and averaging 0.9-million carats a year.

This equates to 5.9 Mt/y, which will match the throughput capability of Venetia’s main treatment plant.

The K01 and K02 orebodies will be accessed through two vertical shafts extending to 1 065 m below surface.

ROCKS STRENGTHENING TAILINGS DAMS

As Mining Weekly flew in, visible from the air was the exemplary way Venetia has used waste rock to bolster its fines residue deposits, rock impounding has been implemented in addition to the normal tailings-related checks, balances, and assurances.

Moreover, the first of six water control doors designed to counter water ingress into the underground mine has been completed, with De Beers and the South African Weather Services collaborating to develop a weather radar system that will detect weather activities beyond the borders of South Africa, into Botswana and Zimbabwe where most of the tropical storms arise.

The water control doors will be activated in the event of water inflows into the mine exceeding the capacity of the underground pumping system, which will ultimately have the ability to pump 4 500 m3/h out of the mine. They are designed to seal off the ‘dry’ side of the mine, where the water pumps and other critical infrastructure are located, from the ‘wet’ side, where mining operations on the kimberlite pipe take place.

“Certainly the sheer size of these doors is unusual,” was Murray & Robert Cementation Contracts Manager Jacques Labuschagne’s comment on the water door which has been built into the rough...

TSX-V-listed Giyani Metals Corporation says a feasibility study for the K.Hill project, in Botswana, has confirmed a low capital intensity for what can be one of the largest high-purity manganese sulphate monohydrate (HPMSM) projects in the world.

The study, which was prepared by SRK Consulting, determines that the project has a net present value of $481-million after tax, with an internal rate of return of 28%.

SRK also finds that the project can be built at a capital cost of $281-million, with strong free cash flow generation of about $99-million a year, for a total net free cash flow of $1.09-billion over the mine life.

First commercial production is achievable in 2025, with an initial throughput of 200 000 t/y of ore.

Exploration work is ongoing to upgrade the project’s 3.1-million tonnes of inferred resources, which will extend the mine life in due course.

Giyani’s probable reserve grade of 18.9% manganese oxides places the project among listed battery-grade magnesite mining peers.

Another consultancy, CPM Group, finds that demand for HPMSM is poised to grow by nearly 30 times between 2021 and 2036, given its use in the production of cathode powers for lithium-ion batteries.

Giyani believes its production process directly from manganese oxide ore does not require power-intensive calcining of electrorefining, which will ensure lower Scope 1 and 2 carbon dioxide emissions. The company also plans on integrating 4.5 MW of solar power into its operation.

The company continues work to lower the project’s operating costs, particularly those related to certain consumables that are affected by supply chain disruption and global inflation. Giyani is also progressing construction of a demonstration plant, which will produce HPMSM samples for testing by potential offtakers by the second half of 2023.

Moreover, Giyani will submit its environmental- and social-impact assessment for approval by Botswanan authorities during the first quarter of next year.

Chairperson Jonathan Henry says the K.Hill project has the potential to be one of the most significant and largest battery-grade manganese producers globally. “The feasibility study shows how far the scope of the project has developed since the preliminary economic assessment in April 2021.”

He concludes that Giyani has early-mover advantage to meet the growing demand for HPMSM from the electric vehicles sector, which is prioritising responsible, low-carbon producers outside of the Chinese supply chain.

Despite its many challenges, 2022 has been a very successful year for the Menar group of companies.

“We increased production at our operations, maintained our solid safety record, and made good headway in the development of our new projects,” Menar chairperson Dr Mpumelelo Mkhabela told Mining Weekly in a Zoom interview. (Also watch attached Creamer Media video.)

Menar is a private investment company with an actively managed and growing portfolio of mostly mining assets. Its growth strategy combines acquisition, greenfield project development and organically growing existing operations.

On course to exceed an annual product target of 2.4-million tons a year is the group’s Khanye Colliery in Bronkhorstspruit, Gauteng, and its Phalanndwa Colliery in Delmas, Mpumalanga, is well on the way to exceeding its targeted two-million tons for the year.

Importantly, both these operations have been able to mine and process significant tonnages while maintaining safety records.

At the group’s Kangra coal mine, in Mpumalanga, the new Udumo Adit – where construction began on 6 April 2021 and was completed in January 2022 – has produced its first coal. Development of Kangra’s Kusipongo reserve could extend the life of mine for another 20 years at least and enable it to continue to support the local communities very meaningfully.

Also being accelerated is the development of Belgarthen A, another adit project, which will further extend mine life and provide additional job opportunities in a rural area where unemployment is rife.

Under development at Zululand Anthracite Colliery in Emakhalathini, about 100 km from Richards Bay in Northern KwaZulu-Natal, is the new Mngeni shaft, which has a resource of 1.2 million tons and an anticipated mine life of 2.5 years.

Finally, East Manganese has enabled the group to gain insight into manganese dynamics, as well as the Northern Cape’s social and regulatory space. “We hope to take the lessons learnt into our next manganese project,” Mkhabela commented.

LOGISTICS CHALLENGES

The lack of trains to transport coal to the Richards Bay Coal Terminal has been the major negative of 2022.

Although Transnet Freight Rail is steadily improving train availability, trucks are still having to be used to transport product to port.

Trucking is far more expensive than rail and it is a cost that the company is having to absorb.

INVESTMENT PLANS

Menar plans to invest heavily in new mining projects until 2025. Its main near-term target is to ensure the full licencing of Bekezela, where mine development investment of R1.5-billion is planned.

With a 22-year life-of-mine, there is optimism that Bekezela will benefit from the government’s plan to cut red tape. The project will employ 320 people directly and create important economic spinoff.

The required licences for the Gugulethu project have been acquired and an investment of about R600-million is planned for phase 1 of this development, where construction is underway. Gugulethu has an estimated life-of-mine of about 50 years, based on a run-of-mine production of about 200 000 t a month from opencast areas, and 200 000 t a month from underground sections. The overall project will create 430 jobs for local community members.

COAL OUTLOOK

The outlook on coal will be influenced by several factors, with Mkhabela highlighting the first of these as global energy requirements.

Second on Mkhabela’s list is global economic recovery, which is continuing to be hampered by sporadic Covid lockdowns in China and Russia’s war in Ukraine.

Third on his list is the reality of climate change concerns as signified by COP27. “This means coal’s unpopularity will continue to gain momentum, but this will have to be weighed against the reality that the transition to renewable energy sources is fraught with many policy and technological uncertainties.

“You don’t need to be a climate change denialist or anti-coal lobbyist to appreciate this fact that, when the chips are down, coal is the default dependa...

Mining Weekly Editor Martin Creamer discusses the backlog of mineral licences being cut by almost 45%; the recent Mistra policy paper which argues that as South Africa moves away from coal, investment will be needed, not only for renewables, but also for coal communities; and Namibia's green hydrogen funding boost from the European Investment Bank.

South Africa-based Gold Fields will continue to execute on its strategy of improving the quality and value of its assets and, in time, will pursue other strategic opportunities, CEO Chris Griffith said on Wednesday.

The JSE- and NYSE-listed company has walked away from its deal to buy Canadian miner Yamana Gold, after refusing to be dragged into a bidding war with rivals Agnico Eagle Mines and Pan American Silver, which offered $4.8-billion in cash and shares for Yamana.

“We were not willing to compromise our prudent approach to capital allocation by getting into a bidding war – no matter how compelling the assets,” Griffith said.

Speaking on a media call following the failed bid, he said Gold Fields was disappointed with the outcome, as the group believed that it had put forward a compelling deal, which would have led to a stronger company for both sets of shareholders.

Although the acquisition of Yamana would have been a good way to execute on the group’s growth strategy, Griffith stressed that it was “not the only and won’t be the only” option available to the company.

“We have a number of assets that are of interest to us as part of our due diligence process. We will now, in the same discipline process, consider those other options in time to come as part of our broader strategy,” he told journalists, but said that it was too early to comment on what exactly the next opportunity for Gold Fields may be.

“The board has given us a clear direction to execute our strategy of improving the quality and value of our portfolio of assets and that is what we intend to do. The Gold Fields of today was built on disciplined M&A [mergers and acquisitions] and disciplined operations. We intend to maintain that discipline.”

Griffith said he was confident that the board "100% had his back", when questioned about whether he felt his job was safe following the failed deal.

The all-stock transaction, announced in May, has attracted criticism from some shareholders and resulted in Gold Fields' share price falling sharply.

"We certainly feel no shame in saying that we evaluated a number of opportunities and that we decided to chase down what we thought was the best opportunity. The board and the management team collectively looked at all the options that were available to us and believe this was the best opportunity on the table. We are not apologetic about chasing down what we think is the best opportunity."

The CEO also pushed back against a suggestion that the several months-long bidding process was a waste of time.

"It certainly was not a waste of time, both in terms of strategy and actually also the landing of a $300-million breaking fee," Griffith said.

Gold Fields will be receiving the break fee, which amounts to about R5.3-billion, in the coming days..

The group has not decided yet what it plans do with the cash, other than saying that it will form part of the normal capital allocation process. This could include paying cash back to shareholders, investing in future opportunities, or reducing debt. “All of those are great ways to return value to shareholders,” Griffith said.

Commenting on the dividend policy that Gold Fields announced in July to sweeten its offer for Yamana, he said that the new policy of paying shareholders a dividend of 30% to 45% of normalised earning remained unchanged. However, the promise of a 45% payout for the 2023 dividend would fall away.

Strategically located Republic of Congo, which is endowed with the key required raw materials, is poised to be a world leader in fertiliser production.

This is the view of Stéphane Rigny, the executive chairperson of Kanga Potash, which has received its licence to mine and produce potash in the country located on the west coast of Central Africa, to the west of the mighty Congo river. (Also watch attached Creamer Media video.)

“The Republic of Congo will become a world leader in the production of fertilisers,” is Rigny’s forecast.

“We have discovered the thickest carnallite seams ever drilled anywhere in the world. The seams of recoverable carnallite are in the order of 210 m thick,” added Rigny.

Carnallite is a mineral consisting of hydrous potassium-magnesium chloride that is an important source of potassium and the thick recoverable carnallite is at a depth of about 1 000 m.

Part of the work we did was to drill the specific licences where we had identified that impairment and we proved up that we do indeed have up to 210 m.

Rigny described the stability of the Republic of Congo as being very conducive for business.

By putting emphasis on power generation, the country now has excess.

The Kanga project is expected to have a number of spinoff industries and a development multiplier effect that Rigny believes is going to reshape the economy of the Republic of Congo.

Kanga, a private company, is entering the preconstruction development phase of a project aimed initially at extracting 600 000 t/y of muriate of potash (MoP) production from its 12-billion-tonne potash resource.

“There is still a bit of a road ahead of us but from the point at which we press the button to effectively start breaking ground and constructing is a 36-month period. We are now entering the phase where we are going to do the front end engineering, which is part of execution. From there we’ll have about a 36-month period.

“All the pieces of the puzzle on the funding side are identified and certainly, in the next 12 months, we’ll be bringing the project to financial close,” Rigny told Mining Weekly in a Zoom interview.

Given the project’s economics and its developmental multiplier aspects, there is significant appetite from private, development finance institution (DFI) and export credit agency (ECA) debt providers.

Regarding the importance of fertilisers, he said: “The entire planet is now very focused on food security, which is a major concern for most parts of the world if not all parts of the world.”

Deglobalisation has set off a race that goes beyond financial returns.

“It’s almost an existential debate with the fertiliser paradigm shifting in the same way as our world paradigm is shifting. We expect huge growth in agriculture and strong demand for fertilisers,” added Rigny.

Kanga Potash aims to develop its project in a phased approach with a first 600 000 t/y MoP production module.

“This will position us as the first African MoP producer and the first MoP producer in the southern hemisphere. From there, we will increase production capacity to over two-million tonnes of production a year of MoP,” he said.

Earlier this year, pressure resulting for current geopolitics resulted in MoP prices rising above $1 000/mt cost and freight (CFR) Brazil. The main importers are Brazil and China and demand is increasingly being seen in Africa.

Mining Weekly: When are contractors likely to be appointed to build the project?

Rigny: A call for tender process was completed and three world class major engineering procurement and construction (EPC) contractors have been shortlisted. Each one of these contractors has the financial capacity, experience and expertise to be our EPC contractor.

Where does the project stand on the cost curve?

The project is unique in the world. It is all about geology and geography. We have discovered the thickest carnallite seams ever drilled anywhere in the world. This has a major impact as it means that we can apply solution mining without ...

The backlog of mineral licences has been cut to 2 625 outstanding applications – 43.5% down on what the situation was in March 2021, the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee Minerals Resources and Energy.

A thousand of the 1 500 prospecting right applications still to be processed are in the Northern Cape and Mpumalanga provinces, Department of Mineral Resources and Energy (DMRE) showed in a 10-slide presentation.

Mining right and mining right renewal applications across all nine provinces total 240.

Also presented by DMRE was an elaborate elucidation on its non-functional Samrad cadastral system, along with the steps being taken to strengthen its internal capacity to manage licensing processing.

Data cleaning underway is 60% complete and a contract position for an information technology project manager is to be advertised.

Terms of reference for the new procurement are still being compiled for completion at the end of this month by a bid specification committee.

The procurement process will then be handed over to the State Information Technology Agency to advertise and finalise the procurement process by December 15.

The department also outlined why its cadastre tender invitation was withdrawn and replaced by a benchmarking exercise with other Southern African states with functioning cadastres that process applications for exploration and mining rights.

Benchmarking with Namibia has been completed and benchmarking with Botswana is scheduled for completion by the end of this month.

As reported by Mining Weekly last month, DMRE takes 354 working days to issue a prospecting right compared with Botswana doing the same in 40 days.

Fellow African countries successfully using off-the-shelf cadastres include Cameroon, Côte d'Ivoire, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Guinea, Kenya, Libya, Malawi, Mauritania, Mozambique and Zambia.

A cadastre is ideally an end-to-end solution that not only awards exploration and mining licences but also monitors regulation, tax and royalty collection, and revenue distribution.

Those entering are presented with a dashboard of mineral rights allocated with explorers able to monitor their obligations, make online payments, and upload work reports and production statistics. Applying for a licence involves simply clicking on ‘apply’.

A mining cadastre also supports the inspectorate divisions of the regulatory authority following up on environmental protection, health and safety.

If all goes to plan, South Africa will have a new mining cadastral system in the first quarter of next year.

With South Africa having committed to transition away from coal, investments will not only be required for the retiring of coal plants and the ramping up of renewable energy, but also for coal communities, who will require alternative economic development plans to sustain the livelihoods of all those affected.

Green hydrogen and fuel cells researcher Dr Nqobile Xaba emphasised this in a nine-page policy paper for Mistra, the research organisation Mapungubwe Institute for Strategic Reflection, headed by executive director Joel Netshitenzhe.

“This is crucial, as climate resilience in South Africa must be built around renewable energy,” Xaba wrote on navigating Africa’s road to COP27.

Mining Weekly can report that the related green hydrogen sector will also receive a percentage of South African funding.

The United Nations Climate Conference, or COP27, currently underway in Egypt, confirms the dire need for funding to combat climate change if we are to implement the energy transition and avert an environmental disaster.

The International Renewable Energy Agency (Irena) notes that an investment of circa $131-trillion in the energy transition is required by 2050 to fulfil the Paris Climate Agreement, and that the lion’s share of this investment must come from the private sector, including 60% from debt financing. To enable this, new instruments are needed, Irena states.

South Africa is set to invest the bulk of an $8.5-billion (R152-billion) climate-finance deal being offered by wealthy nations on bolstering its energy supply.

The absolute necessity of moving further and faster to transition to renewable energy is being repeatedly shouted from COP27 rooftops amid the shock to global energy markets set off by Russia's invasion of Ukraine underscoring the need to move to cheaper, cleaner, safer energy sources that can be built quicker and cheaper than conventional fossil fuel and nuclear power stations.

Widespread media coverage of the speeches given by world leaders at COP27 included United Nations secretary general António Guterres describing the world as being “on the highway to climate hell, with our foot still on the accelerator, and calling for a new climate solidarity pact in which rich countries would help poorer nations financially.

“We are in the fight of our lives and we are losing.We can sign a climate solidarity pact, or a collective suicide pact,” Guterres emphasised.

“Choose life over death.It is not time for moral cowardice,” was the comment of former US vice president Al Gore.

In her Mistra policy paper, Xaba highlighted the vulnerability to climate change impacts of the African continent.

“Extreme weather events will continue to wreak havoc in communities and therefore need urgent solutions,” Xaba added.

A just transition framework for South Africa, drafted by the Presidential Climate Commission, has been adopted by Parliament, the Climate Change Bill has been introduced, and the Electricity Regulation Act, No 4 of 2006 has been amended to allow for uncapped power generation for independent power production.

These are some of the critical policies that are described as enabling the development of an effective climate change response in South Africa. These policy milestones, coupled with the revised Nationally Determined Contribution, are placing South Africa in a negotiating position at COP27.

Climate solutions are described by Xaba as a health priority; and therefore health matters should be prioritised as part of the plans to combat climate change. This is not yet reflected in most health systems in Africa. Rising temperatures coupled with food insecurity, insufficient clean water sources, and higher levels of air pollution result in diseases that threaten lives. The Paris Agreement explicitly links climate action with a healthier environment. Climate change resilience can be built by creating new ways to use the planet’s resources wisely to protect human health and natural ecosystems.

The Right Here, Right Now ...

The commissioning of the first phase of the tin expansion project at the Uis mine in Namibia is complete, AfriTin Mining said on Monday.

Appealingly, lithium and tantalum will also be extracted from the processing streams.

“The beneficiation plant is performing well, and the production ramp-up from pre-expansion levels is going according to plan,” London Aim-quoted AfriTin CEO Anthony Viljoen stated in a release to Mining Weekly.

AfriTin is developing its business aspirations in Namibia by:

expanding its mineral resource base;

expanding its production volume and product portfolio; and

focusing on the supply of metals to the technology and renewable energy sectors.

An infill exploration programme in progress aims to improve the geological confidence of the present lithium and tantalum mineral resource estimates.

To produce a saleable tantalum concentrate, further expansion of the plant has been initiated and successful bench scale tests for the production of lithium concentrate will be followed by the construction of a lithium pilot plant.

Increased plant throughput is also expected to benefit the ultimate production of lithium and tantalum by-products, as these minerals are present in the same ore stream as the tin.

Being investigated is the suitability of sensor-based ore sorting, which has the potential to double or treble ore throughput.

The first-phase expansion project targets lifting production from 780 t/y – involving 470 t/y of tin in concentrate – to 1 200 t/y – involving 720 t/y of tin in concentrate.

Forming part of the project’s scope is modular expansion of the processing plant’s crushing and screening circuits, as well as construction of stockpile for ore fines.

Dry plant expansion allows for the feed rate of ore to the plant to be increased by roughly 50%, with the stockpile providing buffer capacity for greater plant utilisation.

The C4 commissioning certificate, which has been issued by independent mineral processing consultancy Consulmet, is indicative of the entire system being fully operational.