Modern Mining January 2015

PRODUCT News

MBE Minerals invests in pilot plant

the quality of the froth produced recently is anything to go by, then we are on a good wicket here,”Niekerk says. “The natu- ral progression of our work in this sector is to prove within the next two quarters that Pneuflot® can produce market-grade chrome from the final tails of plants in the Rustenburg area.” The pilot plant, comprising a 1 m 3 tank and a cell (separation vessel), is easily con- tainerised for transportation. It can be run in both batch and continuous mode and can treat up to 10 m 3 /h of slurry. MBE Minerals SA offers a full testing programme in Southern Africa. Its laboratory-scale Pneuflot® cell is stationed at Mintek and test work can be done there through either Mintek or directly through MBE Minerals SA, or the unit can be transported to cus- tomer sites. The same applies to the pilot plant. Industrial units are available from 0,8 m to 6 m diameter or in slurry feed rates from 10 to 1 400 m³/h. “MBE Minerals SA can supply its customers with a fully engi- neered solution, from purely designing the flotation process flow sheet together with a 10 % cost estimate to full turnkey execu- tion. As per standard, we provide process guarantees based on both laboratory and pilot/semi industrial scale test work,” Niekerk says. Pneuflot® technology is claimed to use 35 % less electricity then competing technologies. It also features lower main- tenance requirements given that it has no motor-driven mechanism in its cell or expensive auxiliaries. Pneuflot® has a 30 % smaller structural footprint than agitator cells and a 60 % smaller footprint than col-

To date the company has made significant investment in laboratory equipment and a pilot plant in order to prove the technology in local applications. In coal, MBE Minerals SA has already tested material from the Waterberg, Soutpansberg and Central Basin areas. “The results achieved with both the laboratory cell and pilot plant show that our technology is capable of pro- ducing a final product that is within the specifications for both the metallurgical and

Pneuflot® pneumatic flotation technology fromMBE Minerals has been installed at mines around the world.

coking coal markets,”Niekerk says. Recent tests performed on a graph- ite sample from Mozambique Graphite demonstrate the flexibility of Pneuflot® pneumatic flotation technology. Here the Pneuflot® laboratory cell was able to recover large flakes at a top size of 675 micron in a rougher/cleaner com- bination, and in the process produce on-specification material without the need for further regrinding. “This will have a material impact on the company’s bottom line, as larger flake sizes are worth at least a multiple of two over smaller flakes in the world market,”Niekerk says. MBE Minerals SA is also performing pilot plant trials in the platinum industry on PGM ultra fines, which would normally report to tailings. “We proved in a head-to- head test campaign in Canada a few years ago that Pneuflot® is able to outperform column cells on verti-milled product at less than 40 microns. It is early days, but if

MBE Minerals’ Pneuflot® pneumatic flota- tion technology has been installed in a range of applications internationally. In the last six months, the company has commis- sioned plants for a magnetite application in Chile and a scavenger application at the back end of a gold float plant and replaced an existing coal float plant in Russia. The German Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) introduced Pneuflot® into Africa in 2012 through its wholly owned subsidiary MBE Minerals SA, which has been operating in South Africa for more than 47 years, explains Gregory Niekerk, Business Development Manager, MBE Minerals SA. Its extensive footprint of products in the South African mining industry includes the biggest Wet High- Intensity Magnetic Separator (WHIMS) plant in the world outside of Brazil in the Northern Cape, its jigging installation at Assmang and Leeuwpan and a number of screens in the coal and iron ore industries.

umn cells of a similar capacity. MBE Minerals SA, tel (+27 11) 397-4660

72  MODERN MINING  January 2015