PERTH (miningweekly.com) – Graphite developer Triton Minerals has inked a framework offtake agreement with China’s Qingdao Tianshengda Graphite Company over the Ancuabe project, in Mozambique.
The framework offtake agreement was for up to 15 000 t/y of graphite concentrate over an initial five-year term, across all flake sizes.
The agreement was subject to the completion of customer acceptance testwork, and Triton said on Tuesday that the company was preparing samples of Ancuabe graphite to ship to Tianshengda.
Triton pointed out that with the existing memorandum of understanding with China’s Sinoma Overseas Development Company, the company has secured conditional offtake for some 80% of the planned production from Ancuabe, underpinning Triton’s confidence in accelerating development activities at the project.
A recent scoping study into the project revealed that Ancuabe could produce about 60 000 t/y of graphite over a 17-year mine life. The project is likely to require a capital investment of $83-million, with capital costs estimated at $601/t over the life of the mine.