MTUNZINI (miningweekly.com) –  Heavy minerals mining company Tronox on Tuesday officially opened its new R3.3-billion Fairbreeze mine in KwaZulu-Natal.

This is the latest mine of the New York Stock Exchange-listed Tronox, headed by chairperson and CEO Tom Casey, who said the company was also considering a related beneficiation expansion, which would involve an additional investment of more than R1-billion.

The main product of the mine situated near Mtunzini, 45 km south-west of Richards Bay, is titanium dioxide, most of which will be supplied to Tronox’s own US, Dutch and Australian plants producing pigment, an ingredient of paint and plastics.

Two hundred and fifty direct jobs and another 1 000 indirect jobs have been created. At the peak of the mine-building project there were 1 200 workers on site.

The Johannesburg Stock Exchange-listed Exxaro, headed by CEO Mxolisi Mgojo, has a 45% shareholding in Tronox and is the company’s 26% South African empowerment partner.

Tronox also operates South Africa’s Namakwa mineral sands operation and benefits from a vertically integrated suite of mines, smelters and pigment plants.

The first R2.6-billion phase of the operation just opened will provide an initial mine life of six years and will be followed by a second six-year phase at a total cost of R3.3-billion.

Hydraulic monitor guns are used to process the fines operation, run by Tronox South Africa GM Neels Oosterhuis.

Large volumes of water are recovered at Fairbreeze, which replaces the now-rehabilitated Hillendale operation that was closed in 2013.

Tronox VP Robbie Gleimuis reported that construction of Fairbreeze, which came in two months early and on budget, began in 2014 and produced its first product in December.

Gleimuis outlined how the idea of building the mine was first conceived by the former State steel company Iscor, which was searching for vanadium and came across ilmenite instead.

"So it has actually taken us 25 years to get to this point," he added.