Joint venture (JV) company Lobito Atlantic Railway (LAR), which is the concession holder for the operation, management and maintenance of the Lobito Corridor spanning Zambia, Angola and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), has placed an order for 275 new container wagons from South African company Galison Manufacturing for an undisclosed sum. The container wagons will be delivered in three tranches, with the first wagons due to arrive in Lobito from the fourth quarter. They will be able to carry 10 ft, 20 ft and 40 ft long containers, providing flexibility in terms of the kinds of loads to be transported.
De Beers opens entries for this year’s Shining Light Awards
Diamond Miner De Beers has announced that entries for the 2024 Shining Light Awards (SLA) jewellery design competition are officially open. The competition falls under the De Beers Group Designers Initiative (DBGDI), a youth beneficiation skills development initiative aimed at inspiring, igniting and enabling young jewellers with “world-class” jewellery design and manufacturing skills in each of the De Beers Group diamond-producing countries – Botswana, Canada, Namibia and South Africa.
NGX makes appointments to drive graphite downstream strategy
African graphite explorer NGX has appointed Peter Fox and Surinder Ghag to lead and manage the company’s downstream qualification processes and development strategy for producing battery anode material from its natural flake projects in Malawi.
With these appointments, NGX’s plans to establish a downstream processing pathway to supply anode materials for lithium-ion battery production, taking advantage of the exceptional natural qualities of its low-impurity and low cost graphite projects, due to their soft friable saprolite geology.
South Africa now a compelling world investment story, upbeat Orion highlights
“The sun is finally shining on us,” an upbeat Orion Minerals CEO Errol Smart enthused during an Australia/South Africa webinar on Wednesday, when he outlined how South Africa has become one of the world’s most compelling short-term investment stories. Predicting that this country’s investment narrative would super heat over the next couple of weeks, he pointed out how strongly this was advancing Orion’s Prieska copper project, where trial mining has been under way for some time, as well as Orion’s high-grade Okiep copper project, which is following closely behind.
Diamcor seeks to extend closing of second tranche of revised private placement
Diamond mining company Diamcor Mining is seeking to extend the closing of the second tranche of its non-brokered revised private placement following its announcement on June 4 that it had closed the first tranche. The company previously indicated that the original offering, announced on May 1, would be oversubscribed. Diamcor is therefore seeking additional time to accommodate and finalise the documentation and related required items for several additional interested investors.
Taseko restarts mining at Gibraltar
Midtier copper miner Taseko Mines is resuming operations at its Gibraltar mine, in British Columbia, on Wednesday, as a labour agreement have been ratified.
The company announced earlier this week that it had reached an agreement with the union representing workers at Gibraltar. The new agreement will be in place until May 31, 2027.
Infinity Lithium’s San Jose project declared of regional interest
The regional government of Extremadura, Spain, has awarded Premia status to Infinity Lithium’s San José, streamlining the permitting process for the lithium venture.
The ASX-listed company’s project is now recognised as one of regional and general interest, expediting its progression through governmental channels.
Fast-greening Richards Bay Minerals now eyeing on-site renewables, storage, aggregation
Energy-intensive Richards Bay Minerals (RBM), which consumes an average of 1.8 terawatts of power a year, was able to secure its latest 140 MW wind energy power purchase agreement (PPA) in six months. When operating at full capacity, RBMs, power consumption across its mining and smelting operations can reach up to 400 MW and this month’s quickly concluded wind PPA was, in fact, the second renewable-energy project of this Rio Tinto company.
China is building Europe battery supply in Morocco, VW unit says
China is building a battery supply chain for Europe in Morocco, as the continent struggles to develop its own industry to feed electric-car manufacturing, PowerCo’s operations head said. “We don’t have any supply chain. This has to be set up,” Sebastian Wolf, chief operating officer for Volkswagen’s battery unit, said Tuesday at an event in Stuttgart. “Right now, we have to be honest that the set-up of LFP supply chain is happening in Morocco and not in Europe.”
Resources Watch
This week: Copper 360 on home straight to produce quite a bit of cash, CEO reports; Reserve Bank concern about decline of public markets welcome development; and, Artificial intelligence used to eliminate need for rare earths in permanent magnets