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GOLD
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MODERN MINING
August 2016
R
oughly a decade ago (when
Niël Pretorius was appointed as
CEO, a position he still holds),
DRDGOLD was still primarily a
deep-level gold miner, with its
main assets in South Africa – it still had op-
erations in Australasia at that stage – being the
venerable Blyvoor and ERPM mines and the
Crown tailings operation. Since then Pretorius
and his management team have transformed
DRDGOLD, which ranks as the oldest contin-
uously-listed mining company on the JSE, al-
most beyond recognition. The group disposed
of its last underground asset, Blyvoor, in 2013
and is now a 100 % ‘surface miner’, with its
entire gold production being generated from
one of the world’s largest and most technologi-
cally advanced tailings retreatment operations.
DRDGOLD believes that its focus on tailings
retreatment offers multiple benefits, not the
least being the dramatic reduction in risk that
comes with having all operations on surface.
For the most part, the only ‘mining’ that the
group now undertakes is the hydraulic mining
of the tailings resource, which is an operation
that presents relatively few safety risks (and
which is, in any event, performed by specialist
contractors).
Not only is safety enhanced but the labour
requirements of tailings retreatment are also
modest compared to underground mining. To
put this in perspective, DRDGOLD – through
its operating subsidiary, Ergo Mining
Proprietary Limited (Ergo) – employs around
900 people (a figure which would more than
double if contractors are included) to mine
and process 1,8 Mt of material a month. By
contrast, Blyvoor, when it was still owned by
DRDGOLD, employed in the region of 4 500
permanent employees to produce 80 000
tonnes of ore a month. At this level of produc-
tion, Blyvoor was producing roughly 14 000
ounces of gold a month which is not dissimi-
lar to DRDGOLD’s gold production, which in
Blue sky ahead
for DRDGOLD
DRDGOLD’s dump retreatment operation is a high volume, mechanised business which
primarily makes use of high-pressure water jets.
With the R320 million flotation/fine grind (FFG) circuit at its Brakpan (Ergo) plant now working ac-
cording to expectation, DRDGOLD – which has its primary listing on the JSE and a secondary listing
on the NYSE – would seem to have plenty of blue sky ahead. Certainly this seems to be the view of
investors who have pushed the company’s share price up from just 160 cents a year ago to over R11 at
present, reflecting satisfaction not only with solid results over the past few quarters but also
DRDGOLD’s excellent prospects.
Modern Mining’s
Arthur Tassell recently visited the Brakpan plant
(as part of a media contingent) to get an update on the company’s operations.