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Phu Bia to increase gold, copper production
Australian miner Phu Bia Mining plans to increase copper and gold production at its Phu Kham operation in Laos, as market prices for both metals rise.
Pan Aust, the parent company of Phu Bia Mining, announced last week that its board had approved the Increased Recovery Project at Phu Kham, aiming to increase annual copper and gold production by 5,000 tonnes and 7,500 ounces respectively.
Construction of the project is expected to be complete and become operational in the second half of 2013. The Phu Kham Upgrade Project, which will be completed this year, will also help to boost copper and gold production capacity at the plant.
Pan Aust said that once the two projects are completed, copper production is expected to rise to between 65,000 tonnes and 70,000tonnes in 2013 and between 70,000 tonnes and 75,000 tonnes in 2014. Gold and silver production is also expected to rise as a consequence of these initiatives.
current 2012 production guidance is for between 63,000 tonnes and 65,000 tonnes of copper and 50,000 ounces to 55,000 ounces of gold.
According to Pan Aust, the Increased Recovery Project initiative stems from a two year evaluation of various technologies that could potentially improve metallurgical recoveries at Phu Kham.
Plant-scale test work completed in January 2012 confirmed that by incorporating a strategy of less selective rougher flotation in combination with additional regrind and cleaner capacity, recovery rates for both copper and gold could be increased by more than 6 percentage points.
This would lift the currently estimated life-of-mine copper recovery rates from 77 percent to at least 83 percent and gold recovery rates from 47 percent to at least 53 percent. Cash operating cost per pound of copper would correspondingly reduce by more than 5 percent.
The less selective flotation concept is the lowest technical risk option considered as it largely employs debottlenecking of the existing plant through adding further capacity in the areas of regrind, cleaner flotation and concentrate handling, and requires significantly less capital than the alternative processing strategies assessed.
In addition to the recent plant-scale test work, extensive test work has been completed over the past 18 months to demonstrate the technical viability of the project. The concept is also supported by four years of accumulated mineralogical data which has been collected since flotation operations commenced in early 2008.
PanAust said that a detailed capital cost estimate will be defined after more definitive design work has been completed in June 2012. The preliminary capital estimate for the project is US$65 million.
The company said the investment is based on the assumption that the price of copper will be US$3.80 per lb, while the price of the gold will be US$1,700 per ounce.
phnom penh post
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