JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – ASX-listed New Century Resources has selected Australia-based National Pump and Energy (NPE) and South Africa-based Paragon Tailings as the preferred contractors for hydraulic mining service works for the Century tailings deposit, in north-west Queensland.
NPE and Paragon have proposed a two-duty, two standby cannon arrangement to achieve the initial planned eight-million-ton-a-year operation at Century, prior to the addition of a further two duty cannons to achieve ramp-up to the scheduled 15-million tons a year.
“Cost-effective hydraulic mining is an integral part of the company’s projected lowest-cost quartile operations at the Century tailings deposit,” said New Century COO Barry Harris on Thursday.
As part of the tender process, New Century management completed due diligence site visits to hydraulic mining operations managed by the shortlisted companies. This included visits to DRDGold’s Ergo mine, Gold Fields’ South Deep mine and Pan African Resources’ Barberton Tailings Retreatment Project, in South Africa, as well as Amerigo Resources’ Minera Valle Central mine, in Chile and Randgold Resources’ Morila mine, in Mali.
“Key learnings taken from interactions with both the mine owner’s representatives and hydraulic contractors operating these sites have been incorporated into the design of the Century operations to ensure safe and efficient delivery of the tailings slurry to the Century processing plant,” New Century reported.