Displaying items by tag: BMR Mining

Zambia: BMR Group has finished laboratory scale test work on its imperial smelting furnace (ISF) slag dump at its Kabwe site. The company now intends to commission a study to convert its ISFS stockpile into a Joint Ore Reserves Committee (JORC) compliant resource. The site contains potentially 120,000t of zinc.

"These results are especially encouraging as they demonstrate the potential for BMR to extract a greater proportion of the in situ materials at Kabwe than previously anticipated for the benefit of our shareholders. We will therefore be commissioning a JORC survey of the ISF slag and will report the results of this survey to shareholders when available," said chairman Alex Borrelli.

Following the tests the company has announced that, in co-operation with Kupfermelt Metal Processing, its has reached a recovery of 85% zinc and 91% lead at a leach temperature of 80°C and 75% zinc and 80% lead at an ambient temperature. It has also more than halved its sulphuric acid consumption, compared to tests run in September 2015, to approximately 500kg/t. The sulphating acid brine leach process also recovered approximately 90% of the contained vanadium from the slag/leach plant residues (LPR) composite. The IFS slag potentially contains 9000t of vanadium which is expected to be recovered in the form of vanadium pentoxide.

BMR's metallurgical partner has advised that the proposed Kabwe processing plant can in due course be modified to incorporate a sulphating acid brine leach circuit to process the slag/LPR composite. The company's strategy remains however to treat first the wash plant tailings with the acid brine leach process.

Zambia: BMR Mining has identified a new market for Waelz Kiln slag at its operations in Kabwe, Zambia. The ferro-silicate zinc slag can be used for the construction of building blocks. BMR has produced a test batch of building blocks, using an 80:20 ratio of slag to building sand, which has not resulted in the leaching of either lead or zinc.

BMR will submit an application for approval from Zambia's Environmental Management Agency (ZEMA) to produce the slag for building and concrete production. The company is submitting an Environmental Project Brief, which is less complex than approval for an Environmental Impact Study. The application will be submitted in November 2015 and is expected to be approved by the end of 2015.

Once the company has received approval, BMR aims to sell the slag locally to limit costs. "We therefore anticipate BMR generating revenue in 2016, following receipt of ZEMA approval, from both the processing of Wash Plant Tailings and the Waelz Kiln Slag," said BMR Chairman and CEO Alex Borrelli. BMR assets in Zambia include the Chingola Tailings, Kabwe Tailings and Ndola projects.