Prefabricated mine site accommodation and mobile parkhome supplier Speedspace has registered a 15% increase in business in the last year, which the company mostly attributes to the success of its rental solutions, reveals MD Hennie Wiggett.

“With the establishment of new mines and new construction sites, particularly in remote areas across Africa, rental solutions have become a more attractive option than the buying option,” he says, maintaining that, if the option to rent is available, it will receive more consideration than the option to buy, owing to its cost effectiveness.

“In addition, various challenges in the mining industry often result in mines opting for rental solutions, owing to decreases in capital expenditure,” he notes.

Wiggett adds that, as a number of projects are delayed or placed on hold at some point during the development stages, the demand for rented site accommodation tends to increase, as clients do not need to be committed to capital layout for accommodation units, but can rent accommodation for short or long terms.

Meanwhile, Speedspace is providing accommodation for Botswana-based diamond mining company Debswana, owned by De Beers and located in Jwaneng, about 200 km North West of Gaborone.

Wiggett tells Mining Weekly that the company’s Botswana office was awarded the contract at the end of last year. The multimillion-pula project involves expanding the mine’s existing camp by about 1 100 m2 of floor space, which will include 27 management and senior-staff sleeper units to accommodate about 108 people.

He adds that the units, each featuring four single rooms with a floor space of about 9 m2 for each room, are not only self-contained, with en-suite ablution facilities, but also fully relocatable.

In addition, the company installed solar geysers for the ablution facilities to reduce power consumption.

As a result of changes in the scope of the project, the delivery of the units, initially projected for last month, has been delayed, but the company aims to complete the project by mid-April, confirms Wiggett.

Other Projects
Speedspace in December supplied iron-ore major Kumba Iron Ore’s Kathu site, in the Northern Cape, with self-contained access control containers, which are fully insulated and feature solar panels, a backup generator and a full biometric function for access control, including the hardware and software with turnstiles and a boom gate.

In addition, Mining Weekly reported last year that the company completed a project for Kumba’s Sishen mine, in the Northern Cape, which comprised 7 300 m2 of prefabricated buildings, including mobile parkhome sleepers, prefabricated offices and containers.

Speedspace also supplied two large change houses, comprising 700 m² of floor space and heat pump geysers, to diamond miner De Beers’ Venetia mine, in Limpopo, last year, notes Wiggett.

In addition to offering an extensive range of rental units, Speedspace is currently investigating the option of offering self-contained rental units complete with solar panels to ensure that remote areas where accommodation is required remain self-sufficient, and do not rely on State power supply.

Further, Wiggett highlights the expansion of Speedspace’s truck fleet to meet client demand for truck rental to transport the rental accommodation units.

He further mentions that, while the current economic outlook poses several challenges as a result of ongoing unrest in the mining industry and fluctuating currencies, Speedspace will maintain the provision of its short-term and long-term accommodation solutions.