Junior diamond mining company Diamcor Mining notes that optimisation and refinement efforts at its upgraded processing plant, at its Krone-Endora at Venetia project in South Africa, continued as planned during the first fiscal quarter.

These combined efforts continue to demonstrate the processing plant’s potential to support the company’s goal to increase long-term processing volumes, the company says.

Diamcor also reports that gross revenues from the tender and sales of rough diamonds held in its fiscal first quarter, ended June 30, totalled $557 559.

Total carats sold during the period were 3 061.70, resulting in an average dollar per carat of $182.11.

These results were lower, in part, owing to the company electing to withhold 1 944.36 ct from the first fiscal quarter tender and sales planned for June, Diamcor reports.

The withholding of these rough diamonds was done to take advantage of what the company expects will be a more positive price environment forecasted for July.

This resulted in a decrease in revenues realised in the quarter, but Diamcor says it anticipates it will receive higher aggregate revenue for these rough diamonds in July. 

The company experienced reduced processing volumes in the period, when compared to the previous quarter, which was partially attributable to the upgrade optimisation efforts and supply chain delays.

The reduced processing volumes were even more significantly attributable to the unusually cold weather in South Africa during the end of the quarter and into July, resulting in significant unplanned rolling power blackouts implemented by the country’s national power supplier, Eskom, Diamcor points out.

Despite the complications associated with managing these unplanned daily power outages, the upgrades continued to demonstrate increases in processing volumes per operating hour of up to 70% over historical levels, the company highlights.

It adds that the capacity to further increase volumes over the long term is expected once Eskom is able to reduce or eliminate the rolling power outages currently being experienced throughout South Africa.

Diamcor says it continues to monitor the situation and, where appropriate, with due consideration for diesel use and costs, supplement power outages by using genset power and by adjusting operations accordingly for the short term.

Additionally, it is finalising plans to augment its current genset power capabilities to withstand future power outages with minimal interruptions.

Further increases in processing volumes are being targeted as the company continues to refine and expand its operations as planned by the end of the year. 

“We continue to be pleased with the results of the recently completed upgrades, and our operations team has done an excellent job of dealing with the complexities of various global supply chain issues and, more recently, the unexpected national power supply issues in South Africa.

“Despite these short-term issues, the team has continued to deliver on the majority of the planned upgrades on time and on budget,” says CEO Dean Taylor.

“We now look forward to the ability to process material without interruption on a daily basis which will provide us with the opportunity to support our efforts to further increase processing volumes to position our company at a time when rough diamond supplies are contracting,” he adds.