Murray & Roberts subsidiary and construction firm Concor Engineering has been appointed to undertake structural engineering and civil works at the new sulphuric acid plant at Dundee Precious Metals’ (DPM’s) Tsumeb smelter, in Namibia.

The scope of the contract included the erection of all structural steelwork, site fabrication of tanks, installation of mechanical, platework and piping, as well as a portion of the civil infrastructure work.

Concor said in a statement that it is subcontracting to Finnish technology company Outotec for the first phase of the project, which would involve basic engineering, site preparation, final costing and detailed scheduling.

“A total of 6 700 t of steelwork will be erected on site, of which 2 500 t is allocated to structural steelwork, 600 t is tank work and the remaining 3 800 t will be used in the mechanical work, piping, platework and ducting,” the company stated, adding that site establishment was complete and construction had started.

Concor would mobilise its South Africa-based team to the site in Namibia and would supplement its labour force from the local community while implementing a training programme to enable the local retention of plant construction skills.

Owned and operated by DPM subsidiary Dundee Precious Metals Tsumeb (DPMT), previously Namibia Custom Smelters, the Tsumeb plant would operate as an Ausmelt copper smelter on a toll treatment basis.

The construction of the gas cleaning system and sulphuric acid plant at Tsumeb would see the processing of off-gases from the smelter and its converters, which would yield high arsenic-content copper.

This would not only produce a downstream revenue for DPM, but would also, according to Concor, improve the working and living conditions around the smelter, as a result of the reduced emissions.

The acid plant formed part of the Namibian government’s mandate for DPMT to bring the smelter in line with international environmental standards.

The plant was due for completion at the end of 2014 and, based on the expected yearly smelter production capacity of between 240 000 t and 310 000 t of concentrate, would produce between 270 000 t/y and 340 000 t/y of sulphuric acid.