Bushveld CEO Fortune Mojapelo
Photo by: Duane Daws
JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – Diversified mineral development company Bushveld Minerals is accelerating its plans to enter tin mining.
Describing its latest metallurgical results as encouraging, the company said on Monday that final costing was under way to determine expenditure requirements for the establishment of mining and a processing plant at its Groenfontein deposit in Limpopo.
The London Aim-listed company, which in May signed an agreement to buy Evraz’s Vametco vanadium mine operation in North West province, said the results from pilot-scale metallurgical testwork and plant design at Groenfontein would be incorporated into an updated business model, which would focus on near-term production from shallow, high-grade tin targets.
Bushveld CEO Fortune Mojapelo said in a release to Creamer Media’s Mining Weekly Online that the latest results supported the company’s view that high-grade cassiterite concentrates could be produced from the Groenfontein deposit, with relatively good recoveries.
Testwork pointed to recovery of more than 70% on grind sizes of less than one millimetre and a commercial concentrate grade of 74.59% tin dioxide.
Mojapelo commented that the tin market had been particularly positive in a generally negative commodity environment and noted that the tin price had risen 18% since the start of the year on supply constraints.