Modern Mining January 2020

COPPER

erecting the 650-person perma- nent camp at Zone 5 and the first two accommodation blocks have already been handed over. Power for the Starter Project will be drawn from Botswana’s National Grid, which is now being extended by the Botswana Power Corporation to the North West, Chobe and Gantsi districts of Botswana via the Pula 4,6 bil- lion North West Transmission Grid Connection (NWTGC) project, one of the country’s biggest current infrastructure programmes. The Starter Project will be linked to the extended grid by a 132 kV transmission

line from the Toteng sub-station. Khoemacau has recently awarded the contract for the 50 km trans- mission line and two 132/11 kV substations (Boseto and Zone 5) to the CONCO Group, one of Africa’s largest power infrastructure service providers. Work started in Q4-2019. Having grid power is an important plus for the Starter Project, given the huge costs associated with generating power on site from diesel gensets. Indeed, one of the reasons for the failure of the Boseto mine was its reliance on expensive diesel- generated power. Barring any unforeseen delays, the new mine will start up on grid power although Barminco will be dependent on gensets for the first several months of its contract. As its name implies, the Starter Project repre- sents just the first phase of Khoemacau’s ambitious plans for its tenements in Botswana. The company is planning expansions – including increasing the out- put of its Zone 5 mine, development of its resources in and around Boseto and Zone 5 and possibly a standalone mine at the Banana Zone deposit, 80 km south-west of Zone 5 – that could eventually see production increase to as much as 180 kt of cop- per a year. Ferreira says that Fluor has already been appointed to undertake a scoping study on the first stage of expansion, which will be centred on Zone 5 and Boseto and could result in annual copper pro- duction increasing from the approximately 60 kt of the Starter Project to more than 100 kt.

“We’re looking at establishing a new processing plant at Zone 5 which would increase capacity from 3,6 Mt/a to somewhere between 5 Mt/a and 8 Mt/a,” he explains. “Keeping the Boseto concentrator and the proposed future Zone 5 concentrator full will likely involve increasing output from the Zone 5 mine and mining our additional deposits, including Zone 5 North, which is 4 km from Zone 5, Mango, which is to the south of Zone 5, and Zeta NE at Boseto. The timeline for commencement of the first stage of expansion is currently anticipated to be Q4-2022 and, with the study work advancing, Khoemacau’s intention to expand is not in any doubt.” Summing up, the Starter Project represents the second (Boseto was the first) initiative to open up the Kalahari Copperbelt and all the signs are that it is going to be a highly successful venture with mul- tiple expansion opportunities. Moreover, it could be joined within the next several years by the nearby T3 open-pit project, now in the hands of Sandfire Resources after its recent acquisition of fellow Australian company MOD Resources. Clearly, the Kalahari Copperbelt is now emerging as a major copper-mining district and Khoemacau can take satisfaction in the role it has played – and contin- ues to play – in this welcome development, which will diversify Botswana’s mining sector and help to reduce the country’s current over-dependence on diamond mining. Report by Arthur Tassell, photos courtesy of Khoemacau

Surface infrastructure at the Zone 5 site.

Construction in progress in the workshop area at Zone 5.

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