Modern Mining January 2023

ERG and Gécamines restart operations at Boss Mining in the DRC

Benedikt Sobotka, CEO at ERG, said: “We are not only celebrating the return to produc tion at this time, but also our long-standing partnership with Gécamines and its profes sional team, without whom this restart would not have been possible.” The phased restart will concentrate on pro cessing historically mined fines over the next 16 months to produce copper cathodes and cobalt hydroxide. The operation will ramp up over the coming months to its full capacity producing, on average, 1 800 t of copper cath ode and 300 t of cobalt hydroxide a month, by March 2023. 

Eurasian Resources Group (ERG) and its joint venture partner, La Générale des Carrières et des Mines (Gécamines), celebrated the restart of operations at Boss Mining with a ceremony held at its concession in November 2022. Boss Mining, located in the Lualaba and Haut Katanga provinces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), has a long history of copper and cobalt production from significant open-pit resources. Boss Mining was placed into care and maintenance early in 2019 to allow ERG and Gécamines to assess different investments paths and conduct further studies to improve operations’ economics and sustainability.

ERG and Gécamines celebrate the restart of operations at Boss Mining.

Anglo American invests $200 m to accelerate Zero Emissions Haulage Solution

Diversified miner, Anglo American, has signed an agreement with First Mode Holding (First Mode) to combine Anglo American’s nuGen™ Zero Emissions Haulage Solution (ZEHS) with First Mode, the specialist engineering tech nology company that partnered with Anglo American to develop the nuGen™ ZEHS. The transaction is intended to accelerate the development and commercialisation of Anglo American’s nuGen™ ZEHS. Anglo American acquired a 10% strategic equity interest in First Mode in 2021. The transaction includes Anglo American making an additional capital invest ment of $200-million in the combined business to help fund the ongoing development of ZEHS which, upon completion of the transaction, val ues the business in the order of $1.5 billion and results in Anglo American owning a majority shareholding in First Mode. The balance of the equity interest at that time will be held by sev eral of First Mode’s founders and employees.

Anglo American accelerates Zero Emissions Haulage Solution. In addition to accelerating the development and commercialisation of the ZEHS technology, the new combined business will allow strate gic third parties to co-invest alongside Anglo American and First Mode, offering the oppor tunity to accelerate their own decarbonisation and participate in the potential offered by the clean ZEHS technology. 

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