JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – Aim-listed Sylvania Platinum’s Sylvania dump operations (SDO) achieved a 4% increase in production to 17 302 oz of platinum, palladium, rhodium and gold (4E) platinum group metals (PGMs) during the quarter ended December 31.

This followed the acquisition and integration of Phoenix Platinum Mining, which was subsequently renamed the Lesedi operation and clustered with existing dump operations under the SDO, namely Doornbosch, Lannex, Tweefontein, Millsell, Mooinooi Dump and Mooinooi.

Sylvania CEO Terry McConnachie attributed the increase in output to the integration of the Lesedi operation, with 1 458 oz attributable to Sylvania in the past quarter – the highest ounce production this plant had achieved in two years.

“It was a significant quarter for the company, as we finalised the acquisition of Phoenix Platinum, renamed Lesedi, from Pan African Resources. We believe these new assets will add substantial value to our current chrome tailings operations and enable us to increase our yearly PGM production by about 8 500 4E oz/y,” he said.

For the quarter under review, which is historically slower owing to the Christmas period and proved to be slightly more challenging with several technical projects being commissioned simultaneously, the company reported stable revenue of $14.1-million.

“Our focus for the quarter was on increasing plant production volumes, improving plant feed stability, feed grade and recovery efficiencies, and reducing overall production costs. The Lesedi operation, along with project Echo, of which the first phase was commissioned in December, contributed to this strategy,” McConnachie noted.

“With the Millsell and Doornbosch [secondary milling and flotation] modules now in the process of being optimised, we are expecting a significant improvement in production over the next two quarters and remain confident that we will achieve the targeted 75 000 oz for the year post the Lesedi acquisition.”

The group’s earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation decreased 11% from $5.5-million to $4.9-million quarter-on-quarter.

Sylvania maintained a positive group cash balance of $12.6-million for the period.