JSE-listed gold recovery company DRDGold’s Far West Gold Recoveries project, formerly the West Rand Tailings Retreatment project, is set to start pumping reclaimed tailings into the carbon-in-leach circuit on December 6.
DRDGold CEO Niël Pretorius said in a statement issued on Monday that the project is on track to achieve full production of 500 000 t a month from Phase 1 in the first quarter of 2019.
As part of early-stage commissioning, face has been established at the Driefontein 5 tailings dam reclamation site, from which pumping of reclaimed tailings through a new 2 km pipeline to the Driefontein 2 plant is set to begin.
A parallel pipeline to return water from the plant to the reclamation site has been completed.
Work to upgrade the plant’s retreatment capacity is well advanced, with carbon loading – also part of the overall commissioning process – set to begin immediately.
An 8 km pipeline to transport retreated tailings from the plant for cyclone deposition on the Driefontein 4 tailings dam and a parallel return water pipeline from the deposition site to the plant have also been completed.
DRDGold bought Fast West Gold Recoveries from Sibanye-Stillwater in July.