Location The project is located on the northern limb of South Africa’s Bushveld Igneous Complex in Mokopane, Limpopo – the world’s premier platinum-producing region.
Project Description
The Platreef project is a Tier 1 discovery, containing the underground Flatreef deposit of platinum, palladium, rhodium and gold (3PE+Au), nickel and copper.
Ivanplats has declared initial, probable mineral reserves of 17.6-million ounces of 3PE+Au – an increase of 13% following stope optimisation and mine sequencing work. The mineral reserve is expected to support a 32-year mine life at steady-state production of four-million tonnes a year.
Platreef’s Phase 1 startup plan – to process four-million tonnes of ore a year and produce 476 000 oz of 3PE+Au, plus 21-million pounds of nickel and 13-million pounds of copper – was the subject of an independent definitive feasibility study (DFS) completed in July 2017.
The proposed Phase 2 expansion will involve doubling the mine production to eight-million tonnes a year, placing it among the world’s largest PGM mines.
Phase 3 will involve further mine expansion to a steady-state, 12-million tonnes a year, which would establish Platreef as the world’s largest primary PGMs mine.
Key features of the Platreef DFS include:indicated mineral resources containing an estimated 41.9-million ounces of 3PE+Au, with additional inferred resources of 52.8-million ounces of 3PE+Au; and that the project will rank at the bottom of the cash-cost curve, at an estimated $351/oz of 3PE+Au produced, net of by-products and including sustaining capital costs, and $326/oz before sustaining capital costs.Mining zones in the current Platreef mine plan occur at depths from about 700 m to 1 200 m below the surface.
The main access to the Flatreef deposit and ventilation system is expected to be through five vertical shafts. Shaft 2 will host the main personnel transport cage, and the material and ore-handling system. Shafts 1, 3, 4 and 5 will provide ventilation for the underground workings.
Shaft 1, currently under development, will also be used for initial access to the deposit and early underground development. Low-cost, mechanised mining methods will be incorporated, including longhole stoping and drift-and-fill mining.
Mined-out areas will be backfilled using tailings from the processing plant and cement. The mine plan calls for the addition of large, mechanised mining equipment, including 14 t and 17 t load-haul-dump machines and 50 t haul trucks to support the planned longhole mining method. Capital Expenditure The estimated preproduction capital requirement for Phase 1 is about $1.5-billion. Planned Start/End Date According to the latest DFS, Phase 1 is expected to support initial concentrate production by 2022.
Contact Details for Project Information Ivanplats VP and executive head: capital projects Gerick Mouton, tel +27 11 088 4300 or email gerickm@ivanplats.com.
