MechChem Africa March 2017

MechChem Africa

•

March 2017

ccording to Alastair Gerrard, man-

aging director of Zest Energy, the

new generator being constructed

inSouthAfrica for thenewgraphite

mine in Balama will begin producing electric-

ity during the first quarter of 2017, with an

initial capacity of 12.5 MW from an instal-

lation of seven 2 200 kWdiesel generators.

“The isolated location of the Balamamine

– over 250 km west of Pemba in northern

Mozambique – means that while the opera-

tion does have access to power from the na-

tional grid this will need to be supplemented

to ensure an adequate supply for full plant

demand,” Gerrard says. “We are therefore

required by the customer to ensure 100%

availability, and have consequently designed

the plant with substantial standby capacity

to allow formaintenance and repairswithout

affecting the continuous supply.”

The remote operation to mine one of the world’s largest finds of

high grade graphite – the Balama deposit in Mozambique – will

be powered by a generator plant being constructed through

South Africa-based Zest Energy, part of the Zest WEG Group.

Mobile power for Kamoa-Kakula mine

development in the DRC

One of the diesel generator sets for Syrah Resources’ Balama graphite project,

custom engineered and constructed by Zest Energy.

The Zest Energy mobile substation in position on site, connected to the SNEL electrical network. The

photograph shows preparations for hot commissioning and energising in progress.

Balama Graphite Mine

He says the plant,

which was the larg-

est footprint project

yet tackled by Zest

Energy, would ini-

tially run with seven

2 200 kW genera-

tors; six running and

one on standby, and

would later be ex-

panded to include

eleven generators,

of which two will be standby units.

Equipment for the extensive scope of sup-

ply has been sourced fromvarious companies

within the Zest WEG Group, locally and

worldwide. The containerised power genera-

tors includeWEGalternatorswith automatic

voltage regulation systems, as well as mo-

torised louvres, generator auxiliary systems,

and fuel and lube tanks. To cool the engines,

a horizontal-type radiator system, rated for

50 °C ambient temperature, was manufac-

tured in South Africa and each radiator in-

cludes 10WEG3.0kWfanmotors positioned

in two cooling banks of five fans each.

“Oneofthechallengesofthemineenviron-

ment is the presence of graphite dust, which

Thedevelopment of theworld’s largest high-

grade copper deposit – the Kamoa-Kakula

Copper Project in the Democratic Republic

of Congo (DRC) – is now running on power

from the DRC’s national grid using a mobile

substation recently commissioned by South

Africa’s Gauteng-based Zest Energy.

The 120/11 kV mobile substation will

serve the construction of the planned initial

mine at Kamoa-Kakula, a project whose

existing mineral resource has been inde-

pendently verified as Africa’s largest copper

find. Kamoa-Kakula’s principal owners are

IvanhoeMines, ZijinMining and the govern-

ment of the DRC.

“Due to the high cost of running on diesel

generators, the mine developers decided to

purchase a mobile substation to interface

with the network of the DRC power utility,

SNEL, toprovidepower during the construc-

tion phase of the project,” Alastair Gerrard,

managing director at Zest Energy, says.

Although the substation will not be

moved frequently, Gerrardsaysbeingmobile

allowed for quick and hassle-free construc-

tion and commissioning, and gives the mine

the addedflexibility of deploying the substa-

tion to other areas of its operations when

needed in the future.

ZestEnergy–partoftheZestWEGGroup

–undertook thedesign,manufacture, supply,

testing, delivery, installation and commis-

sioning of the complete mobile substation,

including the trailer, transformer and related

electrical equipment. It also provided a pro-