JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – Updating the market on the progress of its Tschudi project, copper asset developer Weatherly International said on Tuesday that “excellent progress” had been made on development of the Namibia-based copper mine, which was now some 57% complete.

During the second quarter, ended June 30, the mining contractor, Basil Read, had been mobilised and waste stripping was expected to start this month, ahead of schedule.

“This augurs well for ensuring that the required stripping will be completed ahead of time, resulting in a further derisking of the project,” the company noted.

Backfilling of the heap leach was 55% complete, while pond excavations were 82% complete and civil works 53% complete. The civil construction of the 66 KV power yard was 95% complete and the control building was 75% complete.

In addition, the administration and plant offices had been erected and the contractor's workshop was under construction. Earthworks were progressing according to plan, with grubbing and the clearing of top soil removal now complete.

Weatherley also completed the recruitment to fill key managerial positions for the project, with the mining manager, processing manager and plant maintenance manager now all in place. 

Recruitment of the mining department's senior staff had also been completed, with the senior geologist, senior surveyor and senior mining engineer to start work in the next few weeks.

ACTIVE OPERATIONS
Meanwhile, the company said on Tuesday that second quarter production of 1 507 t from its active Otjihase and Matchless mines, also in Namibia, was the highest achieved to date since the mines were reopened in 2011, meeting the earlier production guidance.

Compared with the previous quarter, ore treated was up 28%, copper concentrate by 38% and copper contained by 41% respectively.

The company's unit cash cost for the quarter was $5 710/t, which included one-off costs relating to the restructure in the previous quarter.

“This is the lowest cost level achieved in the last two years,” the group noted.

During the quarter, Weatherley delivered 6 288 t of concentrate to metal trader Louis Dreyfus at a weighted average price of $6 737/t.

WORKING CAPITAL
Over the quarter, the company raised £1.7-million by way of a placement of 43.3-million new shares to Logiman, the engineering company building the Tschudi plant, to increase working capital.

The placement was made at a price of 3.95p apiece – a premium of some 44% to the market price at the time of close. 

Meanwhile, by the end of the quarter, Weatherly had paid off $550 000 of the working capital loan to Orion Mine Finance, reducing it to $1.38-million. This left the company with cash reserves, excluding drawdowns under the Orion loan, of around $7.8-million.

The company had drawn down 58% of its loan from Orion Mine Finance, which covered the full cost of the project through to first copper production.