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Platinum group metal (PGM) is once again coming to the fore as a mineral resource that goes the extra mile in protecting a threatened global environment.

The latest indispensable commodity that is poised to be shielded by PGM, which has been safeguarding the air of cities from vehicle exhaust fumes for many decades, is drinking water, which is coming under increasing pollution threat.

Coming to the rescue is now PGM-catalysed hydrogen peroxide, which is providing the world with an opportunity to treat water chemistries that are hard to break down.

The biggest benefit of the ultra-pure hydrogen peroxide that PGM is helping to generate is that it is green, clean and environmentally protective.

The base elements of hydrogen peroxide are water and oxygen, which, when exposed to sunlight, hydrogen peroxide breaks back down into water and oxygen, which is akin to water being the sole by-product of PGM-catalysed green hydrogen-driven fuel cells that power trucks, trains, buses, bakkies, ships, factories, offices, homes and so much more.

Where water is in a constant loop or stored, pathogens build up and it is hydrogen peroxide that is able to remove that threat sustainably.

Johannesburg-based MatiTech has introduced the PGM-catalysed hydrogen peroxide generator - the HPGen - which enables the safe and easy on-site manufacture and roll-out of hydrogen peroxide for use in water treatment.

South African-mined PGM is used in the electrochemical stack of MatiTech's HPGen.

Interestingly, MatiTech has been incubated by global venture capital initiator AP Ventures, which is supported by South African PGM-mining companies as well as South Africa's State-owned Public Investment Corporation (PIC).

MatiTech's forward surge is taking place at a time when global alarm bells are beginning to be rung across the world owing to the increasing level of pollutants doggedly positioning themselves in the world's water sources.

Because the hydrogen peroxide is generated on-site, where there is no need for additives, it is extremely pure, which, in itself, makes it ultra-effective in water treatment applications.

"We then combine this new technology with existing technologies such as ultraviolet disinfection, ozone treatment, reverse osmosis filtration systems, and our ability to treat organic chemistries and organic organisms sets us apart from any other water treatment facilitator," MatiTech MD Mike Bowley emphasised during a Zoom interview with Mining Weekly. (Also watch attached Creamer Media video.)

"With the increasing level of pollutants that we are seeing in our water sources, the technology we're currently using cannot continue to be used.

"We have to find an alternative and hydrogen peroxide is that alternative. When we see high levels of organic pollutants in raw water sources, chlorine derivative disinfection byproducts create carcinogenic byproducts, which unfortunately we're seeing happen in South Africa," said Bowley.

"There are examples of this, and the hydrogen peroxide creates the opportunity to remove that chlorine-based technology and use hydrogen peroxide.

"This is the future of water treatment, and not just in South Africa, but globally. We're seeing research done on it by the Environmental Protection Agency in the US. In Australia, they're doing research on using hydrogen peroxide in water treatment, and, as MatiTech, we're driving that force here in South Africa and in Africa."

Regarding HPGen technology being used on a local mine site, Bowley added: "In essence, the PGM has come home, if you will, on this mining site. It was mined on this site, we've included it in a technology, and we're using this technology to provide drinking water to the mine. It's a vastly important technology that could increase the use of PGMS globally."

Mining Weekly: What are the future problems and issues relating to potable water treatment, affecting not only remote sites...

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Traceability is becoming an increasingly important part of the natural diamond industry, specifically in terms of being able to verify provenance or origin.

G7 sanctions being applied also make traceability technology more important.

"Traceability has an increasingly important role, and I'm sure we'll see more about traceability across the industry going forward," Petra Diamonds CEO Richard Duffy commented to Mining Weekly in a Zoom interview.

The London-listed Petra, which mines diamonds at Cullinan and Finsch in South Africa and at Williamson in Tanzania, is currently trialling two different diamond tracing technologies.

The first is Tracr, used by De Beers, and the second is Sarine Diamond Journey. (Also watch attached Creamer Media video.)

Provided will be transparency from mine to finger for any individual who purchases a diamond in a jewellery store anywhere in the world.

"If it's been through this process with us at Petra, they would be able to receive a physical or a virtual certificate, which would say that their polished diamond was cut from a rough diamond recovered, for example, at the Cullinan mine in South Africa.

"It would also contain all of the information around the number of employees at the mine, the social and community projects that are undertaken at the mine, and, in due course, it will also include information around carbon footprint - information that reinforces that purchase experience and provides verification of the original provenance of that diamond and the journey it's been on to reach that particular consumer's purchase," Duffy outlined.

Traceability will also allow natural diamonds to be clearly distinguished from laboratory-grown diamonds, because lab-grown diamonds do not participate in traceability technology.

Petra expects to implement this far-reaching traceability during the course of this calendar year, which will enable it to clearly verify that the diamonds:

are from a Petra mine;

are natural and not lab grown; and

are not subject to any sanctions.

"It provides certainty for consumers around the diamond they're purchasing, and provides a whole lot of information about that particular diamond as well," Duffy emphasised.

Questioned by Mining Weekly on the current state of the diamond market, Duffy had this to add: "Looking forward, there's certainly some upside as we move towards the end of the calendar year, and this means that we're positive, both for the industry and also for ourselves at Petra."

"If you see the prevailing structural supply deficit, where there are very few new diamond mines coming on stream, and the ongoing demand from the broader luxury jewellery segment, that's all positive, together with growing middle class and growth in high-net-worth individuals.

"India is a good example of that and the US economy has continued to be resilient through this period of high inflation and interest rates.

"We're positive about the market in the medium to longer term, and we've done a lot of work at Petra to make our business more resilient, to ensure that we're able to generate cash in both good markets and more difficult markets," Duffy added.

Petra's historic Cullinan diamond mine is located 100 km north-west of Johannesburg, its Finsch diamond mine is 160 km north-west of Kimberley, and the Williamson mine is 140 km south-west of Mwanza, in Tanzania.

The application of Tracr means that the diamonds from these mines will be subjected to the Internet of Things, AI and blockchain technology to provide comprehensive supply transparency.

In addition, the application of Sarine Diamond Journey begins with three-dimensional scanning to establish a verifiable image of the physical diamond and a definitive link to its digital report.

This enables the creation of an unbroken chain of authentication at every stage of the diamond's journey - from rough to rough, rough to polished, polished to report.

Securely ...

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South Africa's diversified mining company African Rainbow Minerals has secured its 15% strategic shareholding in Surge Copper, Toronto Stock Exchange-Venture Exchange company that is advancing an emerging critical metals district in British Columbia, Canada.

Johannesburg Stock Exchange-listed ARM, headed by executive chairperson Dr Patrice Motsepe, is now a cornerstone investor in Surge, which owns 100% of the emerging Berg project and the longer-term Ootsa asset, which host porphyry copper, molybdenum, gold, and silver deposits.

As a member of the International Council on Mining and Metals, ARM is a steward of minerals and metals that are critical to decarbonisation and sustainable development.

The private placement has been declared unconditional owing to all conditions precedent having been fulfilled, a Johannesburg Stock Exchange News announcement stated.

With copper demand expected to increase from 28.3-million tonnes in 2020 to 41-million tonnes by 2040 at a compound yearly growth rate of 1.85%, under-investment in new copper mines to meet climate goals is of major concern globally.

ARM's C$3.9-million investment is the largest component of Surge's completed C$5-million funding package.

ARM, having successfully subscribed for 41 373 414 common shares at C$0.095 a share, has the right to maintain its ownership position through future equity financings, as well as the right to appoint a member to a technical advisory committee.

On the technical front, Surge is looking forward to drawing on the project and operational know-how of ARM in advancing the Berg project, the first of the two assets to receive developmental mining focus.

Surge, headed by CEO Leif Nilsson, will be conducting six weeks of metallurgical test work programme at Berg, designed to advance flow sheet design parameters and confirm metallurgical recoveries acceptable for use in the prefeasibility study.

Last year's preliminary economic assessment of Berg pointed to an internal rate of return of 20% based on long-term commodity prices of $4.00/lb copper, $15.00/lb molybdenum, $23.00/oz silver, and $1 800/oz gold.

Berg is in the north-western portion of Surge's 100%-owned 125 499 ha contiguous land package in the Berg-Huckleberry-Ootsa district.

A preliminary economic assessment points to a 30-year mine life with total payable production of 2.6-million tonnes of copper equivalent, including 1.7-million tonnes of copper itself.

The combined measured and Indicated resource is an estimated one-billion tonnes of 0.23% copper, 0.03% molybdenum, 4.6 g/t silver, and 0.02 g/t gold.

Interestingly, the porphyry deposits of the Ootsa exploration project adjoin the opencast Huckleberry copper mine of the Vancouver-based Imperial Metals mining company.

Mining Weekly's Projects-in-Progress reported earlier this year that mine planning at Berg is based on conventional drill, blast, load and haul opencast mining methods suited to the project location and local site requirements.

The process design envisaged is based on processing mineralised material from the Berg deposits through copper and molybdenum flotation to produce saleable copper and molybdenum concentrates.

Proposed mine facilities include:

mining administration offices, a mine fleet, truck shop and mine workshop, as well as wash bays;

common facilities, including an entrance/exit gatehouse, a security/medical office, an overall site administration building, potable water and fire water distribution systems, compressed air facilities and power distribution facilities, as well as diesel reception and communication areas;

a near-pit mineralised material and waste crushing facility with associated electrical infrastructure;

process facilities housed in the process plant, including grinding and classification, flotation, regrinding, concentrate handling, reagent mixing and distribution, as well as an assay laboratory, process plant works...

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Managing environmental, social, and governance (ESG) aspects is intrinsic to the long-term success of mining, Gold Fields chairperson Yunus Suleman highlighted at this week's annual general meeting (AGM) of the Johannesburg- and New York-listed gold mining company.

"We have a critical role to play in addressing some of these key challenges facing society at large. The commitment to reducing our carbon emissions by investing in renewables projects is a case in point.

"The projects can be capital intensive, but the board reviews their financial parameters, and we believe that these projects deliver both bottom-line improvements as well as broader strategic and operational benefits - improving our cost effectiveness, ensuring energy reliability, mitigating long-term security of supply risk and reducing our impact on the environment.

"Thanks to our new solar plants at South Deep and Gruyere, we derived 17% of our electricity from renewable sources in 2023," Suleman stated in a release to Mining Weekly.

South Deep's 50 MW solar plant, 50 km south-west of Johannesburg, may soon be augmented by wind power, and the Gruyere joint venture (JV) gold mine is located 1 200 km north-east of Perth.

"We expect that our electricity from renewable sources will continue to improve. In February 2024, the board approved the construction of a $195-million renewable power project at St Ives, which is set to generate up to 73% of the mine's electricity requirements and will support the long-term growth and sustainability of this cornerstone asset. Construction of the plant has commenced," he said. St Ives gold mine is located 630 km east of Perth.

HOST COMMUNITY VALUE CREATION

Suleman regards investment in near-mine communities as being critical to ensuring a social licence to operate and value creation for host communities last year topped the $1-billion mark, driven by community employment, procurement, and social investments.

"Mines cannot be an island in a sea of unemployment and poverty. This is why we seek to create enduring value for our host communities.

"We believe that these projects deliver both bottom-line improvements as well as broader strategic and operational benefits.

"Aside from the wider societal value that these investments and initiatives provide, they also have a direct and positive impact on the performance of our mines," Suleman added.

Gold Fields social, ethics and transformation chairperson Jacqueline McGill reported that since 2016, Gold Fields has created more than $6.3-billion in value for the estimated 750 000 people that make up the group's host community complement.

In addition, host governments last year received $540-million in taxes, royalties, and dividends, with 95% of procurement spend remaining in-country.

Transparent ongoing dialogue with government enables the company to inform policy development and address areas of disagreement, McGill pointed out.

SILENCE OBSERVED TO REMEMBER FATALITIES

The AGM observed a moment's silence to remember five fatalities. Last year, two fatalities took place at the Tarkwa gold mine in Ghana, where a contract worker for the Gold Fields Ghana Foundation was also fatally injured at one of its projects, and two fatalities have already occurred in first four months of this year, one at South Deep in January and the other at St Ives in April.

There have also been two serious 2024 injuries in the year to date, in addition to last year's six, and nearly complete is an independent review of safety processes, standards, and systems.

"We'll collaborate with management to assess the findings of this review and implement the recommendations as soon as possible," Suleman promised.

Commitment to safety and wellbeing extends to psychological safety and mental wellbeing, issues brought into focus last year by the independent Elizabeth Broderick & Co workplace review, which provided insight into the experiences of...

Mining Weekly editor Martin Creamer discusses the renewed focus on ruthenium, water as an alternative source of power and the need for the world to make green hydrogen cheap enough to ensure optimal decarbonisation.

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Johannesburg- and New York-listed Sibanye-Stillwater has concluded its fourth renewable energy power purchase agreement (PPA).

The green metals and gold producer has reached financial close for an additional 140 MW wind energy project, the Umsinde Emoyeni Wind Farm, located on the border between the Northern Cape and the Western Cape, near Murraysburg.

Financial close of the project marks another critical step in the journey to carbon neutrality by 2040, Sibanye-Stillwater CEO Neal Froneman highlighted in a release to Mining Weekly.

Construction will commence shortly, with commercial operation scheduled for the fourth quarter of 2026.

Utilising the national grid through a secured wheeling agreement with State power utility Eskom, the wind farm will supply Sibanye's South Africa operations.

Under the terms of a 20-year PPA, Umsinde Emoyeni will be fully funded by a build, own and operate project consortium, led by African Clean Energy Developments (ACED) and Energy Infrastructure Management Services (EIMS Africa), which are African Infrastructure Investment Managers (AIIM) renewable energy project development, delivery and asset management platforms. Reatile Renewables is also a shareholder in the consortium.

AIIM is a division of Old Mutual Alternative Investments, which has invested in the project through its IDEAS Fund, a domestic infrastructure equity fund. Rand Merchant Bank is the project's sole mandated lead arranger.

Together with Sibanye's previously announced PPAs - which also include the ACED-EIMS-IDEAS Castle Wind Farm - the project brings the total dedicated capacity of renewable-energy projects in construction for Sibanye's exclusive use to 407 MW, which secures 70% of the company's long-term energy requirements in South Africa.

From 2027, this combined renewables capacity will enable a 24% reduction in Sibanye's Scope 2 emissions, or about 1 450 000 t of carbon dioxide equivalent a year, and will further enable socioeconomic development for local communities as well as meet the requirements of the South African Mining Charter.

Meanwhile, Sibanye is continuing to pursue the balance of its 600 MW portfolio of renewable-energy projects in its journey to carbon neutrality.

"The renewable energy secured through our four PPAs will enable a stepped reduction in our carbon footprint, aiming to contribute not only to mitigate the effects of climate change, but also enhancing the sustainability and shared value creation of our South Africa operations through favourable pricing relative to current supply.

"We continue to develop and execute energy solutions that contribute to the delivery of our strategy," Froneman added.

Sibanye, a multinational mining and metals processing group with a diverse portfolio of operations, projects and investments across five continents, is a significant global recycler of platinum group metals autocatalysts with interests in leading mine tailings retreatment operations.

As one of the world's largest primary producers of platinum, palladium, and rhodium, it also produces and refines iridium and ruthenium, nickel, chrome, copper and cobalt.

The top-tier gold miner also recently begun to diversify its asset portfolio into battery metals mining and processing and increased its presence in the circular economy by growing its recycling and tailings reprocessing exposure globally.

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The measures that green metals and gold mining company Sibanye- Stillwater has taken to address loss-making assets are expected to secure yearly savings and capital expenditure deferrals of R6.6-billion, chairperson Dr Vincent Maphai told the online AGM of the platinum group metals major on Tuesday.

The focus of the Johannesburg- and New York-listed Sibanye-Stillwater is on strategic essentials, which Maphai highlighted as being a reduction of operating and capital costs as well as the improvement of efficiencies.

While the company is prepared for an extended period of low prices, it remains constructive about the outlook for metals it produces.

Low prices notwithstanding, this employer of 82 000-plus people reported a 2023 net debt to earnings ratio of 0.58 x at year-end 2023.

"We'll complement our extra existing business and deliver tangible value to our stakeholders," Maphai added.

During question time, Sibanye-Stillwater was asked to give an update on pending retrenchments and whether these would be carried out in a sustainable and responsible manner. The questioner also requested to be advised how retrenched workers would be rehabilitated to alleviate the impact of job loss in South Africa's tough unemployment environment.

In response, Sibanye-Stillwater CEO Neal Froneman said that at a time of some of mine shafts coming to the end of their lives, the company has had to move very quickly to ensure the sustainability of the overall business.

"That's the nature of mining where you're depleting a resource and some of those shafts should have closed pre-Covid.

"We are fortunate in that we have been able to keep them open for longer than what was originally anticipated. However, having said that, it's always tragic and it's a very sensitive issue when you have to restructure your business.

"Unfortunately, we are price takers. We can't control the price of the metals and we're dependent on the revenues and the only real lever we have to pull is costs," said Froneman in pointing out that 60% to 70% of the company's costs are people-related.

"The last lot of restructuring that we're doing is at middle and senior management levels, where we're dealing with adjusting the overheads of the company to be commensurate with the underlying production base. That is also a very sensitive retrenchment process.

"These are all conducted completely in line with the Labour Relations Act and the Section 189 process. We do our best to avoid retrenchments. We look at voluntary retrenchments, we look at retirements, we look at transfers, and, in fact, when you see us close out our 189 processes, there are actually very few people that are forcibly retrenched.

"The 189 process is actually a process that is designed to ameliorate job losses. Those people that do lose their jobs, we look to re-employ when things improve. We ensure they are trained and of course, they get appropriate benefits through that process," Froneman spelt out during the AGM covered by Mining Weekly.

Questioned further on the implications of retrenchment for employees whose working contracts were tied to the mine houses in which they lived, Froneman said this was an issue to which the company would have to apply its mind.

SELF-GENERATION OF ENERGY

In South Africa, relatively little consequence resulted from 2023's low energy availability factor of 55%, owing to solid energy curtailment management by the regional team.

Moreover, from 2025/26, the generation of renewable energy by Sibanye-Stillwater itself will provide close to a third of energy requirements. This will alleviate load curtailment pressures, assist the national effort to end loadshedding, lower costs and reduce the company's carbon footprint.

In working with the authorities, meaningful inroads had been achieved in reducing illegal mining and copper cable theft risk.

"We value our constructive relationship with mine communities, gover...

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Ruthenium, one of the six platinum group metals (PGMs), is once again being given major research attention in view of it being exceptionally suited to uplifting the efficiency and sustainability of green hydrogen production from green ammonia.

Late last year, it was a ruthenium-based catalyst that augmented the scarcity of iridium, another PGM, in the production of green hydrogen from water electrolysis.

Now researchers are optimistic that ruthenium will likely boost the recovery of green hydrogen from green ammonia.

The hope is that it will do so as a key ingredient of the latest "AmmoCatCoat" innovation, which has attracted €2-million worth of three-year public funding from the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research, or BMBF, as part of the Material Hub and Resource Sovereignty funding focus.

"I'm convinced that with 'AmmoCatCoat' we'll succeed in providing a more efficient and sustainable method for ammonia cracking," Heraeus Precious Metals Dr Konrad Krois stated in a release to Mining Weekly from Hanau.

With platinum and iridium PGMs tending to dominate in the hydrogen space, earlier this year Heraeus and South Africa's PGMs major Sibanye-Stillwater partnered in exploring new applications for PGMs in the hydrogen economy, focussing on how applications can also profit from the special traits of palladium, one of the six PGM elements.

Increasing demand for hydrogen purification during the production of blue hydrogen is one possible example of a palladium-based application, with further examples including the cracking of hydrogen carriers as well as applications in the semiconductor industry, where high-purity hydrogen is needed as a process gas.

In moving technologies to scale, reliable process efficiency is key, and PGMs are the most efficient providers of such competence.

In this latest ruthenium development, Heraeus will be leading a consortium of six institutes and companies in researching the use of novel, directly heated catalyst modules based on sustainable carbon, amid the energy transition needing solutions that are material-efficient and competitive in operation.

The latest €2-million, three-year project is publicly funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research, or BMBF, as part of the Material Hub and Resource Sovereignty funding focus.

The Heraeus-led project consortium, which includes project partners such as Fraunhofer ISE, Leibniz Institute for Agricultural Engineering and Bioeconomy, Centre for Transmission Electron Microscopy, PYREG GmbH, and Purem by Eberspächer, combines expertise in catalysis, biomass conversion, material characterisation, and surface treatment.

The aim of the project is to provide a practical demonstration of operation under real-technical conditions at pilot plant scale. Additionally, scaling concepts will be developed.

For transport, hydrogen can be chemically stored in the form of ammonia and then released. For this chemical reaction, PGM catalysts such as ruthenium are exceptionally suitable.

To make the process as sustainable, efficient, and cost-effective as possible, the materials used need to allow operation at low temperature, have high long-term stability, and be used as sparingly as possible, and these project partners are researching how to implement these requirements in a new approach.

The project involves the catalytically active ruthenium layer being applied to an electrically heatable catalyst carrier system, which ensures direct and even heat distribution and heat being brought exactly to where it is needed. The active layer consists of nanoparticles that are finely distributed on a specially tailored carbon material.

Current research results show that the catalytic activity of ruthenium can be markedly improved by using carbon as the catalyst support.

The interaction between the carbon support and the ruthenium nanoparticles should significantly improve the...

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When hydropower was being developed for South Africa's gold mining industry, the industry was going through a tough time and the research organisation of the day, the Chamber of Mines Research Organisation, or COMRO, ceased to function in the form that it had been for 30-odd years.

Had COMRO continued with its intense hydraulics research through what was such an uncertain time that it merged with the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, water power could conceivably have been playing a much bigger role in mining than it is now, and would likely be powering underground machinery to a far greater extent than it is.

By way of catch-up, the book, COMRO'S Legacy, edited by Brian Protheroe, and published by the South African Institute of Mining and Metallurgy as part of a special publications series, highlights how water can be an alternative source of power and how hydraulic power can be used for stope machinery.

"There's a lot of information available," Protheroe commented to Mining Weekly in a video interview - but it has not been disseminated to the extent that it possibly should have been.

As a result, today's mining engineers may not have been made fully aware of hydropower's full potential.

"I think there's huge potential," Protheroe emphasised. (Also watch attached Creamer Media video.)

Water is proven to be highly efficient when utilised underground and can be innovatively deployed in many different ways.

To the COMRO research team, the possibilities of using water seemed endless: "We produced winches which worked on water, so everything could be worked on water. We looked at reverse osmosis and there was a whole sequence of how the mine of the future would look," said Protheroe, who recalled how the impact ripper was envisaged as a round-the-clock mining candidate.

In addition, ice was found to be better at cooling than water, which is better than air.

At the now-closed East Rand Proprietary Mine, the ERPM gold-mining operation, in Boksburg, 8 000 t a day of ice was taken underground in recognition of it having specific coolth four times that of water.

With 10 t of cool air being required for the mining of a single ton of rock, unsurprisingly ice is used to cool the world's deepest mine, Harmony Gold's Mponeng operation, west of Johannesburg. Earlier this year, Harmony approved a R7.9-billion project to deepen Mponeng to about 4.1 km by 2030.

GOLD IS STILL DOWN THERE, CAN WE GO AND GET IT?

The gold price is at a record $2 300/oz and South Africa has a lot more gold at depth. Can a technology, perhaps even one involving miniaturisation, be developed to extract it economically?

"Yes, I think it's open to a new approach, away from the conventional," was Protheroe's response.

A 2 km pipe from surface provides 20 MPa, which is 200 bar, which is enough power for the driving of a machine.

A rule of thumb is that for every ton of rock mined, a ton of water is used, with a mine typically reticulating 20-million litres of water and having a system that includes dams and considerable pipework.

Mining Weekly Editor Martin Creamer unpacks the importance of South Africa locally processing its manganese ore, discusses private investment company Menar's plans to grow its manganese mining and processing operations in South Africa and Gabon and provides an update on Hive Hydrogen's efforts to secure solar energy for its R105-billion green hydrogen and green ammonia project in the Eastern Cape.