JOHANNESBURG – Aim-listed Firestone Diamonds has been selected as the preferred candidate to build and operate a new dredge and a 11,5-million ton a year floating treatment plant (FTP) for Namibian diamond-miner Namdeb.
The FTP project was one of the outsourcing options that Namdeb, which is a subsidiary of diamond giant De Beers, was evaluating as part of plans to extend the life-of-mine of its operations.
Following a tender process, Firestone had been selected as the preferred candidate to build the plant at Namdeb’s operations on the south west coast of Namibia, as well as to operate the plant on a toll treatment basis.
The project would comprise an integrated production unit that would remove overburden using a dredge and treat diamondiferous gravel using a floating treatment plant in a single synchronous operation, Firestone explained in a statement on Friday.
This was expected to significantly lower the Namibian diamond miner’s operating costs.
The FTP, which would have a targeted production capacity of 11,5-million tons a year and a 15-year design life, was expected to start production in 2012.
Firestone and the Namdeb FTP project team were currently revising the initial feasibility study for the project to ensure that it reflected current capital costs and Firestone’s projected operating costs.
Once the revised study was completed later this year, it would be submitted to the Namdeb board for approval. The two parties would then conclude formal contract negotiations and start executing the project.
Last year, Debswana, which was another subsidiary of De Beers, had selected Firestone for a toll treatment tailings processing project at the Jwaneng mine, in Botswana.
Firestone CEO Phillip Kenny noted that these low-risk toll treatment projects presented the company with additional cash flow to that generated at its own operations, in Botswana.
Its BK11 project, in northern Botswana, was expected to ramp up to an output of 1,5-million tons a year by the third quarter of this year, while exploration on a number of other kimberlites continued.
Source: Mining Weekly, March 12, 2010
