PERTH (miningweekly.com) – Copper/gold miner Sandfire Resources has completed a $60-million uplift to the Motheo finance facility, from $140-million to $200-million to support the 5.2-million-tonne-a-year expansion of the project.

The company on Thursday said that the finance facility would maintain its overall seven-year tenure to June 2029, with the usual conditions precedent to be satisfied ahead of the first drawdown in the coming weeks.

Motheo produced its first copper concentrate in May of this year and reached commercial production 45 days later. The expansion project would see the processing capacity increase from the current 3.2-million-tonne-a-year rate to 5.2-million tonnes a year by the end of December next year.

“The uplift of the Motheo finance facility highlights the confidence that our international banking syndicate has in the Motheo operations, and we appreciate their support,” said Sandfire CEO and MD Brendan Harris.

“In parallel, our first shipment of copper concentrate signals the commencement of cash flow generation and earnings at Motheo. As indicated in our recent results materials, we expect to build concentrate stocks through the value chain over the course of this financial year as we ramp up operations, with around 34 000 t of payable copper sales anticipated. This places Motheo in a strong position to support its 5.2-million-tonne-a-year expansion project, which will see production and sales increase to more than 50 000 t of copper in 2025.

“We see an enormous potential to create value for our stakeholders from our strategic position in the highly prospective Kalahari Copper Belt. This year we will test an open extension of the high-grade A4 Deposit and undertake a medium density drilling programme of the newly discovered A1 mineralised zone with the objective of identifying a maiden mineral resource. We will also test numerous other targets within economic distance of the Motheo processing facility,” said Harris.