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NEWS

Oz focused on Carrapateena ramp-up

outh Australian copper producer Oz up the mine,” Oz chief executive Andrew ed 4.25 mtpa can be achieved by year’s
SMinerals Ltd delivered on its promise Cole said. end. However, it remains the company’s
to produce the first saleable concentrate “The streamlined mine design with an long-term goal to transition to block cave
from its new Carrapateena underground expanded footprint will improve cave es- mining at Carrapateena.
mine before the end of last year. In 2020, tablishment, reduce risk during the ramp- Speaking at the SA Exploration & Min-
the company will embark on an aggres- up phase and may enable future annual ing Conference in late November, Oz
sive ramp-up of operations in a bid to throughput expansion opportunities as chief commercial officer Mark Irwin said
reach its desired run rate of 4.25 mtpa we continue to assess options to expand a PFS on various caving opportunities
within the next 12 months. capacity above 4.25mt annually.” would be finalised mid-year.
First concentrate was initially sched- Carrapateena’s output for 2020 is ex- “The opportunity is for us to convert
uled for delivery in November 2019 but pected to be 20,000-25,000t copper and from sub-level cave to block cave by
had to be pushed back a month after an 35,000-40,000oz gold at an estimated about 2026,” Irwin said.
incorrect part was supplied during the full-year C1 cost of $US1.80-2/lb. Oz also “Our assumptions at the moment are
construction of the processing plant. De- indicated unit costs will be higher in the – and we’re very comfortable with those
spite a few anxious moments for share- first half due to the fixed-cost nature of the assumptions – that we have the abil-
holders, Oz confirmed the milestone had mine, about 160km north of Port Augusta. ity to process upwards of 10-12 mtpa on
been achieved within the timeframe set A more detailed guidance was ex- that block cave, which will be upwards of
more than two years ago. pected to be released with the December the 4.25 mtpa that we’ll be processing
In an ASX release announcing the 2019 quarterly report at the time of print. through the sub-level cave.
milestone on December 20, Oz indicated Oz plans to continually test and op- “What’s been very helpful is we actually
“sufficient” saleable concentrate would timise plant works in the first half as it have high-grade bornite both in the sub-
be delivered to the filter feed tank to chases gradual increases in throughput level cave but also through the deposit
complete the first concentrate press on and recoveries which it hopes will lead itself, so by being able to go to the block
schedule. The company also said more to a higher output at the back end of the cave model, where you mine from the
than 280,000t of development ore has year. bottom up, we’re able to access the much
been stockpiled on the surface for the Sub-level cave mine production also higher grade bornite-hosted copper more
2020 ramp-up campaign. began late last year and Oz is confident readily than if we mined top-to-bottom
“Our key operational focus remains on its optimised mine design will allow for a over time.”
underground development as we ramp- more rapid ramp-up, ensuring the target- Irwin said the company wanted to have
completed all of its studies for block cave
mining scenarios by 2022 as that was the
crunch point for what it needed to do next
with its declines.
Meanwhile, mineral sands miner Iluka
Resources Ltd has hailed its shift in focus
from Jacinth to Ambrosia as a success.
The operational move was originally
slated for 2022, but Iluka opted to bring
that transition forward to last year in an at-
tempt to “smooth” the company’s overall
zircon production levels.
Iluka technical services manager Nick
Bartsch said the transition was completed
on time and on budget.
“It is expected we will be able to sustain
similar levels to what we were mining at
Jacinth for the first few years at Ambro-
sia and then in later years, when grades
do decline, they will be able to be supple-
mented with concentrate already stock-
piled on site from Jacinth,” Bartsch said.
Iluka is attempting to sustain zircon
production around 335,000 tpa at Ja-
cinth-Ambrosia for at least the next two
years. Additional feed could come from
the Atacama satellite deposit, about 5km
north-west of the existing mining centre,
The first saleable copper-gold concentrate from Carrapateena was produced on as early as 2022, pending a positive out-
December 20. Oz intends to aggressively ramp-up operations over the next 12 months to come from the upcoming PFS.
meet its target 4.25 mtpa run rate by year’s end – Michael Washbourne

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