JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – The great exploration geologist who made the colossal and still-thriving diamond discovery against all odds at the Venetia diamond mine in Limpopo believes there is no reason why new battery and other specialist minerals cannot be discovered in South Africa, using the techniques that he applied in diamond exploration in those days.

The highly experienced and hugely successful exploration geologist Bill McKechnie , who was heavily involved in greenfield exploration in South Africa, was also behind many other diamondiferous kimberlites, including The Oaks.

South Africa undoubtedly has the endowment in many areas, McKechnie told Mining Weekly in a Zoom interview. (Also watch attached Creamer Media video.)

But he lamented the tiny 0.93% of total global exploration expenditure that is coming to South Africa this year, although $4-million of it, interestingly, is for grassroots exploration for lithium, “which is one of the new battery revolution minerals coming through”.

When McKechnie joined De Beers in 1974 with a Bachelor of Science (honours) in geology from Aberdeen University in Scotland, he began his career carrying out diamond exploration in an that was hardly recognised but that turned out to be highly prospective.

“The process of discovery starts off by someone being willing to invest their money first of all, and find people investing their time and effort in doing work that needs to be done to discover new opportunities, if these are available.

“In South Africa, when you look at the geological environment, there are some commodities that are easier to find than others, because South Africa is so well known geologically.

“I think that’s part of the reason why people under estimated, at that time in the 1970s, the diamond potential as it then was.

“There’d often been a feeling that everything that need ed to be discovered had been discovered, and that was quite clearly wrong.

“I spent a long time involved in diamond exploration in South Africa. It’s a different environment now. It’s much better known. But there’s no reason why other minerals, more exotic minerals, things that are now driving the new battery revolution and other and specialist minerals, the techniques that we applied in diamond exploration in those days could apply to those new discoveries.

“That’s the scarry thing that we have to consider at the moment. If one looks at world global exploration, there’s $8.3-billion planned to be spent on global exploration throughout the world in 2021, and only less than 1% – 0.93% – of that is coming to South Africa, according to S&P Global.

“Their numbers won’t be exactly right, but they are the best proxy that we have at the moment.

“That amounts to $77.4-million of expenditure. Now, that sounds a lot of money in South African terms once you multiply it out by the current rand exchange rate, but a terrifying thing is that is that 50% of that is going into projects on existing mines.

“Because when you look at the exploration pipeline, you have grassroots exploration, which is the early-stage exploration, which is the type of work I was involved in in my De Beers days, in looking for new grassroots diamond discoveries.

“And then you have feasibility studies being done on projects where there may have been new discoveries or, what’s mainly happening at the moment in South Africa, is that all discoveries are being rehashed again. Old defunct projects are being revitalised and reconsidered,” McKechnie revealed.

Fifty per cent of South African exploration thus goes extending the lives of existing mines that are on their way to depletion, with 34% of the $77.4-million going into the few new discoveries, old defunct projects or projects identified and taken forward further.

“So, only 16% of the $77.4-million is going into grassroots exploration,” McKenchie pointed out.

More than half of that 16% is going into gold: “I was very surprised to see the amount of money being spent on grassroots gol...

JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – South Africans are well within their rights to be very proud of the iron-ore that is produced in the country.

That is the view of Sedibeng Iron Ore CEO Aneesh Misra , who is also MD of IMR South Africa. (Also watch attached Creamer Media video.)

Switzerland-based IMR, as the majority owner, came into the management of the Sedibeng iron ore operation two-and-a-half years ago. Since then, it has been focusing on optimising the operations and trying to improve the efficiencies.

Located near the town of Postmasburg, in the Northern Cape, Sedibeng has a rail-matching capacity of two-million tonnes of iron-ore a year – but, with more rail availability, it could be producing considerably more iron-ore for export.

IMR is also part of a consortium that is acquiring the PPC Lime mining and processing operations, also in the Northern Cape, for R515-million.

Sedibeng produces lumpy iron-ore and the iron content combined with the hardness of the lumps “definitely provides an edge against some of the other products that are available from Brazil and from Australia,” Misra told Mining Weekly in a Zoom interview.

“The demand is there and I think South Africans are well within their rights to be very proud of the material that is produced in the country."

Typically, global market pricing is conducted against Platts, with a lump premium attributed for what the lump brings to a blast furnace in the steelmaking process.

“There’s a lump premium that is attached to our sales but obviously it is guided by market demand so the moment that there are huge environmental restrictions that come into play in China, the lump premiums do start making an impact, particularly because lumps are more desirable from a blast furnace perspective and reduce the environmental impact as a result.

Sedibeng’s output capacity matches the rail allocation that it has on the 861-km-long electrified heavy-haul ore export line (Orex) to the Port of Saldanha, for export into global markets.

“In terms of the future growth plans, the mine can definitely expand. The mine can produce 2.5-million tonnes to three-million tonnes but obviously that’s guided by how much rail capacity can come on line on the Orex side of things,” said Misra.

The way that IMR envisions any investment into any mining asset is by attributing value to the local workforce.

Its focus is to remove overworked corporate structure in the company and to instil more responsibility and authority into the existing workforce and to implement initiatives that were brought in by the workforce itself.

“When we went into the investment, no one had quite envisioned the height to which the iron-ore price would ascend.

“It was pre-Covid, pre-exiting Covid and trying to understand the market as a whole. The volatility is so great that one can never benchmark any operating feasibility at these existing prices.

“When we were considering Sedibeng and when we executed the deal, it was back in 2018. At that point, iron-ore prices were considerably lower. They were hovering around $70/t to $75/t, and even then Sedibeng was a company that was operating efficiently and profitably at those levels.

“We focused on trying to bring our cost threshold down and we would like to think that we have used the time to prepare for when the prices do correct,” said Misra.

All of Sedibeng’s iron-ore goes to China, where the unlisted company has cultivated a home for its product in certain steel mills.

“At two-million tonnes a year we don't have the longevity to get into offset contracts and two-million tonnes for a market like China is a drop in the ocean.

“But there are certain steel mills that we do work with. We try and optimise our sales strategy accordingly and therefore it’s a hybrid where it is going into spot on a monthly basis, but we know our end-users and we try to manage their need as much as possible,” Misra added.

LIME INVESTMENT

As reported by Mining Weekly, IMR, as part of the new owner of PPC Li...

JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – Arne Frandsen ’s great green graphite offering debuts Monday when trading of the shares of Nouveau Monde Graphite begin on the New York Stock Exchange.

There is no half measure with Nouveau Monde Graphite chairperson and Pallinghurst managing partner and co-founder Frandsen when it comes to greenness.

When he says ‘green’, it is not just the graphite cathode he is talking about, but the mine as well. (Also watch attached Creamer Media video.)

His thinking is the same for the group’s Sedibelo Platinum Mines in South Africa’s North West, where an innovative new platinum group metals (PGMs) mining and processing project slashes 82% off electricity use and elevates platinum to a new high level of greenness.

Frandsen and his partner, Andrew Willis , have spent the past three years developing a strategy to deliver the largest battery grade graphite mine in the world, which he told Mining Weekly in a Zoom interview is fuelled 100% by hydroelectricity.

“So, there’s zero carbon footprint. The little carbon footprint we have we’re offsetting through planting more trees on our mining area.

“We’re presenting something which is 100% green, 100% carbon neutral. If you want to have decarbonisation and electric vehicles, it doesn't work if we as miners are polluting the planet as we extract the minerals,” he reiterates.

“This will be the largest company of its kind outside China and, as you know, if you want a battery, you need both a cathode and an anode and we will produce the anode,” he explained.

SHARE PRICE RISE

In addition to listing and trading on the NYSE in US dollars, Nouveau Monde’s common shares continue to be listed and trade on the TSX-V in Canadian dollars and Nouveau Monde’s common shares will also continue to trade on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange.

In a downward market, this week’s announcement of Monday’s debut trading sent the share up more than 10%.

“There’s a lot of excitement around it. The people are more concerned now about supply chains and certainty of supply, and that comes in addition to where we talk about being green and making sure that we are sustainable in the material that we’re producing. Any supply chain should be diverse and right now we’ll be the only one of size outside of China.

Regarding the New York Stock Exchange, he said: “There’s an openness from the New York Stock Exchange. It is the largest capital market in the world and it has been really interesting for me to spend the last year in dealing with the New York Stock Exchange. It also gives me a lot of hope for potential for companies outside of Canada as well,” he said.

CUTTING CARBON EMISSIONS

PGMs producer Sedibelo Platinum Mines Limited, of which Frandsen is chairperson, is expanding its Pilanesberg Platinum Mines and building the revolutionary new ‘green’ Kell processing plant, which uses only 18% of the energy normally associated with conventional PGMs smelting, axes associated carbon emissions, improves recoveries, lowers operating costs and eliminates sulphur dioxide emissions.

Earlier this year, Frandsen told Mining Weekly that he had been in contact with investors in New York who are very interested in what the group is doing, because their mandate is to invest in businesses that lead to a lower carbon footprint for the globe, and that is exactly what Kell is doing.

Kell’s carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) emissions from concentrate to final refined metals are only 19% of the CO 2 emissions caused by the current smelting/refining route.

“It’s not only what we want, but that’s what our investors want and what the consumers want,” he said.

Sedibelo shares an interest in Kell South Africa with South Africa’s State-owned Industrial Development Corporation (IDC) and founder Keith Liddell through Lifezone.

“The IDC has been an enormously supportive investor since 2012. They’ve put money in, they’ve put quality management in and when it comes to Kell, before it was fashionable, the IDC was part of it. I’m extremely happ...

Aim- and JSE-listed midtier gold producer Pan African Resources has raised its production guidance for the financial year to end on June 30, by 5 000 oz to 195 000 oz.

It plans to maintain a similar production level for the 2022 financial year, based on current planning.

CEO Cobus Loots says management is pleased with the robust operational performance for the year to date.

In terms of growth projects, the company reports that following positive findings from a fatal flaw analysis conducted into the Mintails Soweto cluster (MSC) and Mogale Gold assets (collectively the Mintails assets), no fatal flaws were identified.

Going forward, Pan African reports that a concept study was conducted on the Mogale Gold assets, including a high-level financial evaluation, with the findings indicating an enhanced tailings throughput feed of about 800 000 t a month, with anticipated recoveries of about 53%.

The estimated upfront capital required of about R1-billion and the R1.7-billion in capital needed over the life-of-mine will be confirmed during the next stage of the project planning.

However, the concept study did identify areas that would require further evaluation during the prefeasibility stage of the project, including tailings storage facility deposition capacity constraints, which would require additional development to support the anticipated life of the project.

Also, the study identified the availability of water sources in the area to supply the re-mining of the Mogale Gold or MSC assets, as well as additional confirmatory process test work to confirm gold recoveries.

Key inputs used in the concept study’s financial evaluation include a real discount rate post tax of 10.71%, a gold price of $1 770/oz, an exchange rate of R14.50 to the dollar and a net present value of R1.46-billion.

Other key inputs include a real after-tax internal rate of return of 42.8%, project capital of R1-billion, an expected life-of-mine of 12 years and average production of 44 400 oz/y.

The miner reports that a prefeasibility study will be completed during the third quarter of the current calendar year for the Mintails assets; and, if positive, will be progressed to a definitive feasibility study, expected to be completed during the first quarter of the 2022 calendar year.

EVANDER MINES

Following technical challenges experienced during the initial phases of the 8 Shaft pillar mining, production levels anticipated in the original feasibility study have now been achieved, the miner reports.

This operation is expected to produce an average of 34 000 oz/y over its remaining life-of-mine of two years and five months, measured from end of the 2021 financial year.

As for Evander’s 8 Shaft decline operations, deep level underground mining at Evander was ceased during May 2018 after a decline in the rand gold price at the time, with Pan African continuing to maintain the mine’s infrastructure integrity to preserve the mineral resources.

However, as part of its medium-term capital deployment strategy, Pan African has commissioned an internal technical and economic study to assess the merits of mining the number two decline on 24 Level project (Phase 1).

This study will be followed by a Phase 2 study that will assess the merits of extending mining to 25 and 26 levels.

Phase 2 is designed to use a proven on-reef mining layout, reducing waste and significantly reducing the time for ore body access development.

Phase 1 mining will extend Evander’ 8 shaft production profile, post-cessation of the 8 Shaft pillar mining, for an additional two and a half years and maintain yearly production of about 34 000 oz.

The 24 Level project will result in a five-year life for the Evander 8 Shaft complex.

EVANDER SOLAR PLANT

Pan African’s 9.97 MW solar photovoltaic plant at its Evander mine, being commissioned by juwi Renewable Energies, has commenced with civil works and the procurement of major components, with commissioning anticipated in the third calendar quarter of this ye...

JSE-listed diversified miner Afrimat has entered into a purchase agreement with Aquila Steel and Rakana Consolidated Mines for the acquisition of a 100% stake in the Gravenhage manganese mining right and associated assets near Hotazel, in the Northern Cape.

Afrimat CEO Andries van Heerden says the greenfield, near-development project, with a life-of-mine of more than 20 years, is one of the last independently-owned, undeveloped manganese deposits in South Africa.

It is situated about 50 km north of Hotazel and about 120 km from Afrimat’s existing Demaneng iron-ore mine.

The purchase consideration is payable in two tranches, with the first $45-million tranche relating to the buying of the property.

The $15-million second tranche is payable 12 months after the date on which manganese ore or iron-ore is recovered and delivered to stockpile or the processing facility, or if Afrimat enters into an agreement with a third party resulting in it retaining less than a 50% interest in the mining right.

Going forward, the acquisition is subject to the fulfilment of Afrimat being granted a water-use licence, Competition Commission approval and approval in terms of Section 11 of the Mineral and Petroleum Resources Development Act.

The acquisition also requires the approval of the Chinese State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council for the sale of Gravenhage and the assumption of the assumed liabilities as contemplated in the sale agreement having been obtained by Aquila Steel.

The conditions precedent must be fulfilled by August 20, 2022.

Following the meeting of these conditions, Afrimat plans to get personnel on site to strip the overburden and start mining, which Van Heerden estimates will be about 9 to 12 months from now.

BUSINESS DIVERSIFICATION

Afrimat initially started as a construction materials business focused on the quarrying of aggregates.

After the 2008 financial crisis, the company diversified into industrial minerals, becoming a “strong player” in the lime and dolomite niche-product markets because it produced “really high-quality” minerals supply into the construction markets, Van Heerden tells Engineering News & Mining Weekly.

The Gravenhage expansion into manganese is a continuation of Afrimat’s bulk commodities growth and diversification strategy, as well as building on its presence in the Northern Cape with its close proximity to the Demaneng iron-ore and Coza mine operations, which provides “operational and logistical synergies”, he says.

In addition, another major benefit to having the Gravenhage mine close to other Afrimat operations is that the miner can better conduct business and operations, as well as leverage established skills in the region.

The successful development of Gravenhage will increase Afrimat’s reach into the ferrous metal value chain and its exposure to foreign currency denominated earnings.

In 2015, Afrimat entered into the commodity space, buying a small iron-ore mine which “turned out to be a very good acquisition”, Van Heerden enthuses.

Since then, the company has bolstered its iron-ore reserves in the Northern Cape, he says, telling Engineering News & Mining Weekly the company currently has “quite good life-of-mine in the region”.

Also, in 2020, Afrimat further diversified its portfolio with the acquisition of the Komati anthracite mine – a high-quality reductant producer.

“Our strategy is that over the years, we have learnt the whole portfolio effect of having a variation of different minerals in our portfolio and diversification of our portfolio – it smooths the earnings potential for the business,” says Van Heerden.

EXCITING PROJECT

The Gravenhage project was “very exciting” for Afrimat for three reasons, he tells Engineering News & Mining Weekly – the first reason being that it will produce high-quality material.

“It is one of the last remaining known reserves of any proper size in the Kalahari field,” says Van Heerden.

Secondly, the project creates a...

Mining Weekly Editor Martin Creamer discusses Anglo American calling the global climate crisis "something that exceeds anything seen in centuries"; a call for unemployed geology graduates to capture historic exploration data; and the PGMs opportunities coming out of the hydrogen economy being compared to the 90s emissions boost.

Mining investment firm Menar has officially launched its first-to-portfolio manganese mine, East Manganese, in Hotazel, in the Northern Cape.

MD Vuslat Bayoğlu expects the mine to produce its first ore in July and to ramp up to nameplate capacity of processing 30 000 t a month of ore by August.

The 900 000 t reserve will be mined over a two-year mine life, as a starting point for the company to build expertise in the manganese mining space.

The mine comprises a single, 14 ha openpit operation, which is located on a 43 ha portion of the bigger 1 000 ha mining right area.

The R250-million project will produce mostly lumpy manganese and some fine material for export to the Chinese market.

A dry crushing and screening plant will be commissioned over the next few weeks on site, which will greatly contribute to ensuring the mine’s water use efficiency.

Bayoğlu says Menar also has markets for manganese in India and Europe, but most of the product goes to China owing to its significant steel production activity.

He adds that demand for manganese is strong at the moment, despite the price not necessarily being that high.

In terms of export logistics, Bayoğlu confirms that State-owned freight utility Transnet is struggling with some rail capacity challenges at the moment, but Menar nonetheless applied for a Manganese Export Capacity Allocation 2 (Meca 2) allocation.

Under Meca 2, 15% of Transnet’s manganese rail capacity is allocated to new entrants in the manganese export market.

“We are aiming to truck the product to a neighbouring mine site and rail from there, but while we await Transnet’s approval of our application, we will truck product to the port.”

With the mine producing 30 000 t of manganese a month, the company is considering building a small-scale power plant, coupled with grid power and back-up generators, to meet the mine’s 1 MW power capacity requirement.

Bayoğlu concludes that the company’s decision to diversify the Menar group’s commodity portfolio is in keeping with the firm aspirations of becoming a leading South African diversified mining company.

The company is looking to invest in more manganese assets and discussions are underway for assets in this regard, which the company will share in due course.

Menar is an active private mining investment company with interests in thermal coal, anthracite and manganese assets in South Africa, a nickel/cobalt asset in Turkey and a gold asset in Ala-Buka in Kyrgyzstan.

JOHANNESBURG (mingweekly.com) – Recent generations have defined the environment as a critical issue for humanity and climate change represents a new and sharper focus that exceeds any single global issue “that we’ve seen in centuries”, Anglo American CEO Mike Cutifani has told the Bank of America Securities Global Metals, Mining and Steel Conference.

Moreover, when viewed in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic, the fragility of the human species becomes an even more compelling case, Cutifani said in his presentation covered by Mining Weekly.

“For us as an industry, the transition to a decarbonised society ­– and what that means for both demand and supply for our products – becomes the defining issue of our time.

“At Anglo American, we will be part of the solution, we will provide commodities necessary for that transition. We’ll fulfil our obligations in a responsible way while ensuring that we make a real difference within the local communities that we partner,” Cutifani said.

While mining’s physical footprint was a small 0.04% of global habitable land, compared with the 50% agricultural footprint across the globe, mining’s commodities were absolutely key in decarbonising energy and improving the environmental footprint right across the globe – “and that includes increasing biodiverse areas”, he added.

“For us sustainability in every sense of the word provides us with a platform to improve our long-term value proposition.

“We’ve got a broad portfolio of assets and new opportunities that we’ve developed and we're thinking for the short-, medium- and the longer term.

“Within the context of our purpose to reimagine mining to improve people’s lives, we believe the delivery of sustainable returns to shareholders, employees and societal stakeholders is an imperative that will define the long-term success of our business.

“In defining what we need to deliver, we’ve been crystal clear. In talking to shareholders, we target a better-than-ten percent pre-cash flow yield on capital employed through the price cycle as the prime measure of our effectiveness as business managers.

“Obviously, we’re going to do a hellova lot better than that this year. To measure our efficiency in delivering those cash flows, we also aim to deliver better than 15% return on capital employed, again through the price cycle, and we’ll do a hellova lot better than that as well this year.”

He said Anglo measured sustainability across seven pillars, which included safety and health, environmental, social and governance (ESG), productivities per person and competitive cost and capital measures.

“We believe that in the last 12 months, we’ve again overtaken our major competitors in terms of our aggregate cost position across all of our commodity positions so that our margins are continuing to grow and today we are the most competitive of the major miners across the sector.

“This is what we think about when we come to work every day and our purpose and ambition drives our strategy and its execution. Our portfolio is now focused on quality assets with a continual tilt towards future enabling commodities,” Cutifani said.

“We think the mining industr,y and we as a company, are perched on the edge of quite a material opportunity.

“In the shorter term the world has stimulus packages estimated at between $10-trillion to $20-trillion over the next ten years, many of which are focused on metals-intensive infrastructure.

“We also face growing population over the medium to longer term that will need food, energy and shelter. The middle classes will grow and associated wealth effect will reach an even larger and more diverse population pool,” he added.

FUTURE ENABLING PRODUCTS

Sixty five per cent of Anglo’s portfolio by value and over 90% of its growth capital is on future-enabling products. The other 35% is its high-value-in-use iron-ore and metallurgical coal assets.

“Our integration with our ESG strategy is unique in the industry and its evolution has taken us past our com...