Eurasian Resources Group secures electricity supply for DRC copper mine

27th November 2018 By: Creamer Media Reporter

Diversified natural resources group Eurasian Resources Group (ERG) has concluded an agreement with electricity company Société Nationale d’Électricité (SNEL) for the supply of 41 MW of electricity for its Frontier mine, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).

SNEL will source the electricity from Zambia's State-owned electricity company Zesco.
 
The Frontier mine, situated on the DRC–Zambia border, is an opencast copper mine with processing facilities capable of treating more than ten-million tonnes a year of copper sulphide.

“We are pleased to be able to achieve a reliable electricity supply for our Frontier mine. This new agreement further demonstrates ERG’s commitment to the DRC and Zambia and further cements our wider strategy on the continent as a whole," ERG CEO Benedikt Sobotka said this week.

Zesco MD Victor Mundende added that the power utility was committed to providing power supply to the mine while local power sources were not available.

SNEL director-general Jean-Bosco Kayombo Kayan pointed out that SNEL planned to eventually supply the Frontier mine with electricity produced in the DRC. He said existing hydroelectric plants and power lines were currently being rehabilitated.

ERG owns copper and cobalt mining operations in the DRC, as well as copper, cobalt, manganese, platinum, bauxite, fluorspar and coal development projects in the DRC, Zambia, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Mali and Mozambique.

It is also developing a 20-million-tonne-a-year iron-ore mine in Brazil.

In Kazakhstan, it owns and operates iron-ore and ferro-alloys mining operations.