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Effective wastewater treatment crucial

BRINGING OUT THE COPPER Codelco is one of the global mining companies benefiting from Degrémont’s wastewater treatment services

BRINGING OUT THE COPPER Codelco is one of the global mining companies benefiting from Degrémont’s wastewater treatment services

Photo by Bloomberg

24th April 2015

By: Bruce Montiea

Creamer Media Reporter

  

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Wastewater treatment works at mines must provide a competitive solution for their capital expenditure and operating expenditure, says water treatment plants designer and developer Degrémont South Africa mining business development manager Andy de Bruin.

He says Degrémont works with engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) companies to design, build and operate water treatment facilities to clean water for mines.

Depending on the terms of the contract, Degrémont can enter the process at any stage of the facility’s development.

“We can design and build the facility for the EPC company to operate and maintain or the EPC contractor can build the facility and we can operate and maintain it on its behalf. Alternatively, we can also design, build and operate the facility on an EPC company’s behalf,” says De Bruin.

He adds that Degrémont maintains regular contact with consulting engineers to provide its expertise and support in the development of water treatment technologies, as well as its assistance with pilot plants and bringing about new technologies.

He says Degrémont offers package solutions with limited civil work structure that make them easy to carry and install.

In addition, De Bruin tells Mining Weekly that water treatment equipment must not only be simple and easy to maintain but must also be robust. “The process must be easy to operate while it reduces the challenges associated with . . . accessing sites . . . and the quantity of by-product or ultimate waste.”

He says Degrémont has become aware that mining companies prefer simple proven technology that can help them to, besides other aspects, vaporise liquid and solid waste streams and provide selective removal technology for trace metals.

Degrémont South Africa, a subsidiary of industrial services and solutions resources company Suez Environnement, is undertaking projects in South Africa, Morocco, Tunisia and Uganda for mining companies, such as mining majors BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto, as well as copper mining company Codelco, says De Bruin.

He notes that Degrémont provides water- management solutions, such as extraction, concentration, refining, closure and recovery, for mines.

“Our expertise is process water production, wastewater treatment, acid mine drainage treatment and metals recovery. We develop new solutions with the mining companies as we have done with Codelco, in Chile, for a molybdenum treatment plant.”

Other Degrémont service offerings include the design and construction of pipelines, the desalination of seawater, the reuse of processed contaminated water, the recovery of precious minerals in leach streams and zero-liquid discharge through crystallisation, as well as the evaporation and removal of heavy metals and solids.

In March, all 40 Suez Environnement companies, which are spread across 70 countries, were brought under one roof in an effort to speed up the group’s development.

Edited by Leandi Kolver
Creamer Media Deputy Editor

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