JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – The ramp-up of the Nova project, in Western Australia, has been delayed by three months, diversified miner Independence Group confirmed on Wednesday.
The company reported that the project would reach its nameplate capacity of 1.5-million tons a year in the September quarter, instead of the June quarter, but pointed out that the revised timeline remained a year ahead of the date set in the feasibility study.
Independence previously said that underground development rates had been lower than planned, but that underground contractor Barminco had taken certain actions since January to increase development rates. The average daily development rate has improved by 43% between January and March.
The miner said that Nova would produce between 5 000 t and 6 000 t of nickel and between 1 900 t and 2 300 t of copper in the 2017 financial year. The first offshore shipments of copper and nickel concentrate are scheduled to start in the June 2017 quarter.
At full production, Nova is expected to produce 26 000 t/y of contained nickel and 11 500 t/y of contained copper, at an all-in sustaining cost of A$1.83/lb. The project is expected to initially operate for ten years.