Modern Mining September 2018

COUNTRY FOCUS: MOZAMBIQUE

see ROM ore being processed at a rate of 500 000 t/a to produce 45 000 to 50 000 t/a of dry graphite concentrate with an average grade of 96,7 % TGC. The initial pre-production capex has been reduced to just US$51,2 million with payback being achieved in approx- imately two years. The process route comprises crush- ing, milling (in a closed circuit rod mill),concentrate regrinding and cleaning, concentrate filtration, and drying, screening and bagging. Battery Minerals anticipates that the metal- lurgical recovery will be in excess of 80 %. Product will be trucked over a distance of 260 km by road to the Port of Pemba for export. The pro- cessed tailings will be deposited in the Tailings Storage Facility (TSF) and process water will be recycled back into the processing plant for reuse. The Stage 1 production rate will be doubled in Stage 2 of the project, which has a capex of between US$25 million and US$29 million and which is expected to follow hard on the heels of Stage 1. First exports from Stage 1 are anticipated within 12 to 15 months of proj- ect finance being finalised. The mine life of Montepuez is greater than 10 years. It is antici- pated that lower grade stockpiles could feed the plant for a further 10 years after the com- pletion of mining. Battery Minerals notes in its most recent quarterly report (for the June 2018 quarter) that significant progress has been made on the site earthworks and camp construction and that it has entered into various contracts for long lead-time plant and equipment and developed a number of site roads. It says that subsequent payments and plant delivery to site will be sub- ject to funding. At a simlar stage of development to Montepuez is the Ancuabe project of ASX-listed Triton Minerals. Following the completion of a positive DFS on Ancuabe in late 2017, Triton announced on 1 June this year that the project had been approved for development and that early works were underway. Blessed with a highly favourable location in terms of logistics (it is just 93 km by road from Pemba), Ancuabe – which lies on a property surrounding the existing Ancuabe mine – will be developed as a conventional drill-and-blast, load-and-haul operation which will exploit two deposits – T12 and T16. The mining fleet will likely consist of around 12 articulated dump trucks working in conjunction with two 75-t

Above: Drilling and logging at Mustang’s Caula project (photo: Mustang Resources). Left: Core sample showing graphite from the Caula project (photo: Mustang Resources).

tracked excavators, as well as a suitable fleet of ancillary equipment. The proposed process plant facilities for the project in the DFS include a tertiary crushing circuit; a rod mill feed bin and grinding circuit; rougher flotation; three stages of attritioning and five stages of cleaner flotation; concentrate filtration; concentrate drying, classification and bagging; and tailings thickening and storage. The DFS envisages a production of 60 000 t/a of graphite concentrate over an evaluation period of 27 years. According to the study, Ancuabe ranks as a high margin project with the ability to deliver an average annual EBITDA over the evaluation period of US$43,6 million (including ramp-up). It puts the pre-production capital cost of the project at US$99,4 million with payback being achieved in 3,8 years. In February this year, Triton announced the appointment of Lycopodium ADP as the Project Management Consultant (PMC) and, at the end of June, reported that it had signed a Letter of Intent (LOI) with MCC International (MCC), the overseas business platform for Metallurgical Corporation of China Ltd, for the award of the Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) of the mineral processing facility and

September 2018  MODERN MINING  29