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BY ELIZABETH FABRI NEWMONT Mining has entered a deal to acquire Canadian gold company Goldcorp for $US10 billion. The acquisition marked the second large-scale merger in the gold industry in the last six months following Barrick Gold’s landmark purchase of Randgold Resources in September 2018 for $US6 billion. Under the deal, the two miners would form Newmont Goldcorp; the world’s largest gold miner by output, with a portfolio of assets across North and South America, Canada, Australia and Africa. Newmont would acquire each Goldcorp share for 0.3280 of a Newmont share, with Newmont and Goldcorp shareholders to own 65 per cent and 35 per cent of the combined entity respectively. Goldcorp currently operated four mines in Canada, one in Argentina,…

BY ELIZABETH FABRI RIO Tinto subsidiary Kennecott Exploration (KEX) has inked a Joint Venture option deal with ASX-listed Valor Resources over its Berenguela copper-silver-manganese project in south-eastern Peru. Initial terms of the agreement included a payment of $US700,000 before February 2019, and further $US2million spend on exploration over the next 12 months. At the completion of initial expenditure, Kennecott would be entitled to form a 50:50 incorporated joint venture by paying an additional $US3million to Valor, and increase its stake to 75 per cent by spending an additional $US5million within three years. Valor Resources executive director Nicholas Lindsay said bringing Kennecott in as a partner to the project was a significant and exciting step forward in its development, and endorsed…

AUSTRALIAN privately-owned conveyor component OEM, PROK Conveyor Components Pty Ltd, a NEPEAN company, has finalised negotiations to extend its conveyor component capability with the addition of a fully operational specialised OEM pulley business based in Gosford, NSW. NEPEAN chief executive Miles Fuller said the new business was a perfect extension to its conveyor pulley capability in key mining regions and will strengthen PROK’s offering to customers on the east coast of Australia and internationally. With the integration of Tefco Engineering’s assets, PROK was positioned to provide customers in core mining regions with a dedicated and local option for OEM pulleys and pulley overhauls. “PROK Conveyor Components gains a significant conveyor component manufacturing facility in NSW. The new facility will be…

RECOGNIZING that throatbush wear rate has a major impact in the overall efficiency of slurry pumps, Weir Minerals has developed superior rotating and axial adjustment technology. In many applications, the pump’s throatbush is the component that has the shortest life compared to the impeller and liners, with considerable variability. Adjusting the gap between the throatbush and the impeller front shroud reduces hydraulic recirculation in the pump. This prevents localised wear on the throatbush, improves hydraulic efficiency and lowers the total ownership cost for the operator. To avoid impacting the plant’s production, these adjustments are often performed while the pump is operating. However, this can have safety implications for individuals working at the front of the pump unit. “Manually adjusting an…

All images: South 32. BY AMY BLOM THE world’s largest and lowest-cost manganese ore producer is set to produce even more, as South32 launches a three-year drilling program at GEMCO. South32 has continued to surge on the back of its Groote Eylandt Mining Company operation (GEMCO), with exploration plans underway designed to leverage even more value from the manganese mine. GEMCO is an open-cut mining operation in the Gulf of Carpentaria, 50km from the Northern Territory mainland, producing high-grade manganese ore that is then shipped to South32’s Tasmanian manganese alloy plant (TEMCO) and around the world. According to South32, GEMCO is one of the largest and lowest-cost manganese ore producers in the world. Together, GEMCO and TEMCO form South32’s Australian manganese operations.…

All Images: MMG BY EMMA DAVIES MMG’S Rosebery mine in Tasmania recently achieved an important milestone – mining and milling 1 million tonnes on a rolling 12-month basis, for the first time in its more than 80-year history. Rosebery’s record result was achieved following improvements to the mine’s tailings dam, insourcing of the mine development work, and an upgraded fleet. MMG Rosebery general manager Jenkins Kroon was pleased with the site’s production rates. “In the third quarter of 2018 Rosebery produced 19,218 tonnes of zinc in zinc concentrate, broadly flat when compared to the second quarter of 2018 and up 12 per cent on the prior corresponding period,” Mr Kroon said. “The strong production was driven largely by another record…

Image: Talison Lithium. BY ELIZABETH FABRI TALISON Lithium’s mammoth Greenbushes mine in south-west WA is entering its next phase of growth with a $320 million expansion to double production nearing completion, a $516 million second expansion greenlit to begin in 2019, and a further $1 billion commitment made towards downstream processing. Talison Lithium’s owners Tianqi Lithium and US group Albemarle are pouring some serious capital into their long-running Greenbushes mine in WA’s south-west as the State begins its transition into a global hub for battery metals and value-added processing. In early 2018 the State Government established a Lithium and Energy Materials Taskforce aimed at understanding opportunities from the emerging industry and creating a strategy going forward. The Greenbushes mine – 250km…

Minotaur Exploration executive director business development Tony Belperio. Image: Minotaur Exploration. MINOTAUR Exploration has already had significant success at its Eloise joint-venture with OZ Minerals 60km southeast of Cloncurry in QLD thanks to its targeting of a relatively unknown style of deposit called Iron Sulphide Copper Gold (ISCG). As drilling continued into the Jericho copper-gold system at the end of 2018, Amy Blom spoke with Minotaur executive director business development Tony Belperio about the benefits of targeting ISCG deposits, recent results from Jericho, and plans to roll out the exploration model elsewhere. Q. Minotaur Exploration has achieved a breakthrough based on a new deposit style called ISCG. What led to Minotaur’s decision to target this particular style of deposit?  …