Australian mining company Equinox says that while the amount of ore mined at its Lumwana copper mine, in Zambia, increased by 1 192 822 t during the first quarter of this year, it only man- aged an increase of 154 642 t in the second quarter, a figure that CEO Craig Williams says is “well below the company’s expectations”.
He says that key contributing factors to the second quarter results included decreased availability of the mine’s mobile equipment fleet, decreased shovel and truck productivity and cycproduction steel slag crushing plantle times, and transi- tional ore zones.
“Availability and producti- vity parameters continue to improve and, as a matter of urgency, management is deve- loping strategies to further increase producsmall scale crusher price philippinestivity and mine output.
“These strategies include engaging specialist consultants to advise on opportunities to improve productivity, and the company is intensifying its internal training programmes thow many crusher typeso improve workforce skills and expertise,” says Williams.
He adds that, while the vari- ous issues that impacted on production at Lumwana during the second quarter could have been managed with minor implications, the compounding effect, within a short space of time, presented significant limi- tations to maintaining suitable ore supply to fully realise the company’s large processing capacity.
There is a lot of expectation that the project will add signi- ficant value to the Zambian eco- nomy and will once again elevate the country to one of the continent’s fastest-growing mining hot spots.
In addition to copper, the Lumwana orebody also boasts significant uranium resources.
“The pits currently being deve- loped on the Malundwe copper orebody include the uranium zones at Valeria South and Valeria North. As these uranium zones are being selectively mined and stockpiled, they are not treated by the copper concentrator and are effectively classified as ‘waste’ to the copper project.
“This uranium-rich copper ore stockpile may be treated at a later date, if and when the company builds a uranium plant, but is not contributing to current production cash flow,” says Williams.