Tag Archives: Northern Territory

Newmont starts Rokion R400 battery-electric vehicle trial at Tanami

Environmental, Mine operation news, Mining equipment, Mining services, Power supply for mines, Precious metals, Sustainable mining, , , , , , ,

Newmont’s Tanami operation in the the Northern Territory of Australia has started trialling a new electric vehicle in its underground operations.

The Rokion R400 will initially be used to transport team members up and down the mine, the company said in a post on Facebook. The vehicle is equipped for the transport of 12 people and comes with a battery capacity of 100 kWh.

Newmont said the vehicle is fitted with good suspension and ergonomics, being designed for passenger comfort.

Early indicators show the vehicle has the capability to complete several trips to and from the bottom of the Tanami mine without requiring recharging, Newmont said.

“We hope the trial proves to be successful, and can become the starting point for the future of electric vehicles both light and heavy at Newmont Tanami,” it added.

This is not the first Canada-manufactured Rokion battery-electric vehicle to make an entrance in Australia. The company has previously tested both a Rokion R200 and Rokion R400 at BHP Mitsubishi Alliance’s Broadmeadow mine in Queensland.

Newmont, meanwhile, is in the process of expanding the Tanami operation through the Tanami Expansion 2 project. This is expected to increase the annual capacity of the processing site to 3.5 Mt/y, from 2.6 Mt/y, and extend the life of the mine beyond 2040.

GR Engineering to tackle surface infrastructure for Tanami Expansion 2

Mine operation news, Mine shafts and equipment, Mining services, Precious metals, , , , ,

GR Engineering Services Ltd has executed a subcontractor agreement with RUC Cementation Mining Contractors Pty Ltd in relation to work on Newmont’s Tanami gold mine in the Northern Territory of Australia.

RUC has been engaged by Newmont under a head contract to complete certain construction works for the Tanami Expansion 2 project. Included within this is shaft lining, equipment and headframe construction.

The scope of work for which GR Engineering is responsible comprises the construction and commissioning of the temporary and permanent works associated with the surface infrastructure.

Based on the current budget for the scope of work, it is anticipated that revenue from the subcontractor agreement will be approximately A$68 million ($51 million), GR Engineering said. Work is expected to be completed by April 2023.

Back in November, the two companies signed a “teaming agreement” related to the project.

Geoff Jones, Managing Director of GR Engineering, said: “GR Engineering is pleased to have executed this first subcontractor agreement with RUC and we look forward to working with RUC to deliver safe and successful outcomes for Newmont and on other future projects. GR Engineering continues to build its pipeline of work for financial year 2022 and financial year 2023.”

The Tanami Expansion 2 project is expected to increase the annual capacity of the processing site to 3.5 Mt/y, from 2.6 Mt/y, and extend the life of the mine beyond 2040.

Hastings Deering rebuild program pays off for Rio Tinto’s Gove operation

Equipment maintenance, Industrial minerals, Mine operation news, Mineral project development, Mining equipment, Mining maintenance, Mining services, , , , , , , , , , ,

Hastings Deering has been sustain output at Rio Tinto’s Gove bauxite open-pit operation in the Northern Territory of Australia by boosting engine power during the rebuild of dozers.

The Cat D11T dozer is purpose built to move more material and ensure maximum availability through its planned life cycle, the Caterpillar dealer says. For Rio Tinto, Dozer 79, had built up over 37,000 hours ripping and pushing bauxite at its open-pit operation.

Rio Tinto knew it wanted to undergo a Cat Certified Rebuild for its dozer but had to come up with an innovate way to do this while minimising equipment down time, Hastings Deering said.

Brendan Coleing, Superintendent, Mining Maintenance, said the Gove operation has focused heavily on building safe and reliable machinery to meet the targeted life of its assets and maintenance schedules.

“With a 24/7 operation, we need to plan and strategically think about our assets, their maintenance and lifecycle,” he said. “By planning large maintenance projects in advance, at Rio Tinto, we’ve been able to compensate for machinery downtime and achieve some great energy efficiencies.”

One of the key projects that helped to allow for the nine-week Cat Certified Rebuild (CCR) was the D11R repower project.

In early 2020, the Hastings Deering team worked with Rio Tinto on an alternative solution for engine replacement in its D11R fleet that reduced costs, fuel use and emissions while extending lifespans. This incorporated replacing the 3508 engines the machines originally came with, with the newer C32 engines.

“Recent success with repowering our D11 fleet with C32 engines has helped our mining operations move more bauxite due to increased power in the machine,” Coleing states. “This in turn allowed us to remove Dozer 79 out of production, and into the workshop to complete a Cat Certified Rebuild.”

Alongside the increase in machine availability, this project presented a budgeted fuel burn reduction of up to 25%.

“Our like-for-like material movements are now done with significantly less fuel which is a great environmental outcome,” Coleing said. “They’re also quieter, making them a little more comfortable for the operator.”

With Cat equipment built to perform over multiple lifetimes, the CCR was the most efficient way to help get the most economic value out of the original asset investment.

A CCR is a full machine rebuild that provides a like-new machine, inclusive of all Cat updates, to help achieve a full machine life supported by the Caterpillar warranty, Hastings Deering says.

Brad Read, Service Manager at Hastings Deering, said the CCR program is an efficient way for customers to improve the planned lifecycle of their machines.

“Given Dozer 79’s upcoming power train, hydraulic and major component change outs, a CCR was a cost-effective way for us to maintain the asset through to the end of its target life,” he said. “Customers opt for a CCR as it provides the ability to rebuild their machine, including all technological advancements, over purchasing a new machine. This helps to reduce capital expenditure.”

Read said that the CCR offered an extended scope or work over a standard rebuild and took careful planning between the Rio Tinto and Hastings Deering teams.

“The CCR takes up to nine weeks to complete and covers an extended scope of work including power train replacement, hydraulics and electrical components, cab overhaul, work implement overhaul and ET testing and painting,” he said.

“Effective planning is critical to the success of a large-scale project like a CCR. The team needs to ensure all stages of the rebuild have been planned, scheduled and are on time to guarantee machine delivery back to the customer.”

“It is essential to support our customers in their operation.”

By successfully planning the CCR after the success of the C32 repower project, Rio Tinto and Hastings Deering were able to improve the performance of its equipment and compensate for the removal of Dozer 79, Hastings Deering said.

Coleing said: “By undertaking work in this manner, we’ve removed a massive amount of forward log of work that not only gave us immediate availability but provided us with an improved asset through to the end of the machine life.”

RUC Mining set for Newmont Tanami shaft lining and equipping contract

Mine operation news, Mine shafts and equipment, Mining services, Precious metals, , , , , , ,

RUC Cementation Mining Contractors says its RUC Mining business has been awarded preferred bidder status for the shaft lining and equipping contract at Newmont’s Tanami Expansion 2 project in the Northern Territory of Australia.

Additionally, Newmont, last week, granted RUC Mining authority to proceed with long lead procurement RFQ process via a short-term contract to progress the works, the contractor said.

Back in November, RUC Cementation Mining Contractors and GR Engineering Services agreed to team up as part of a plan to construct surface infrastructure, as well as complete the shaft lining and equipping, for a proposed hoisting shaft at the Tanami Expansion 2 project. There was no mention of this agreement in the latest news from RUC Cementation.

“RUC Mining is excited to be engaged on the major project with global leader Newmont, the world’s largest gold producer,” it said. “Together we look forward to safely progressing the Tanami Expansion 2 project, delivering long-term value to both Newmont and RUC shareholders.”

Subject to finalisation of agreements, the contract award is expected this month, it said.

The Tanami Expansion 2 project is expected to increase the annual capacity of the processing site to 3.5 Mt/y, from 2.6 Mt/y, and extend the life of the mine beyond 2040.

NRW Holdings bags mining contract at NRR’s Roper Bar iron ore project

Mineral project development, Mining services, Steel and iron ore, , , , , ,

NRW Holdings has been awarded the mining contract for Nathan River Resources’ Roper Bar iron ore project in the Northern Territory of Australia.

Roper Bar has a fully integrated ‘pit-to-port’ logistics chain including a privately-owned 171-km paved access road to an existing barge load-out facility and product stockyard, according to NRW.

The project was commissioned in October 2020 with first direct shipping ore (DSO) exports in November. Production ramp-up is nearing completion, with four vessels now completed (around 220,000 t). An offtake agreement exists between Glencore and NRR for the marketing and distribution of iron ore from the project.

This contract award covers the Stage 1 operations at Roper Bar, with production of 4.6 Mt of DSO and 1 Mt of dense media separation production at 1.5-1.8 Mt/y over three years. The contract scope includes drill and blast, load and haul, clearing and grubbing, top-soil and subsoil removal and rehandling of ore stockpiles.

The contract value is circa-A$123 million ($95 million) and has a duration of 33 months. At its peak, there will be around 55 site-based personnel on the project.

NRW’s CEO and Managing Director, Jules Pemberton, said: “NRW is pleased to be involved in the recommencement of the Nathan River mine site and looks forward to its successful execution.”

Alliance extends Newmont Tanami aviation services agreement

Mine operation news, Mining services, Precious metals, , , , , , ,

Alliance Aviation Services has executed a contract extension with Newmont Mining to continue chartering flights for the miner to the Granites Mine Site in the Northern Territory of Australia from bases in Perth, Darwin and Brisbane.

The three-year agreement servicing Newmont’s Tanami mine in the Northern Territory extends the current contract with the miner until 2024.

“This contract is considered by Alliance to be material as it is forecast to represent between 5% and 7% of revenue in the next 12 months,” the company said.

Alliance has been providing services to Newmont continuously for the last nine years, with Lee Schofield, Alliance’s Chief Executive Officer, saying the company is “thrilled” to be continuing this relationship.

“Air charter services to Newmont’s mine site have increased over the last nine years and it is the only site in Australia where we fly into from three different states/territories,” he said.

“This contract extension was won due to the ability of Alliance to continue to operate safe, reliable and cost-effective air charter services for Newmont.”

Newmont says Tanami is a fly-in, fly-out operation in one of Australia’s most remote locations.

MinEx CRC goes under cover in Australia with National Drilling Initiative

Mineral exploration, Mining equipment, Mining services, , , , , , , , , , , ,

MinEx CRC, reportedly the world’s largest mineral exploration collaboration, has successfully completed its first National Drilling Initiative (NDI) campaigns, including a 10-hole, 4,000 m drilling campaign in the East Tennant area of the Northern Territory of Australia, to assess the mineral potential of basement rocks in the region.

While gold has been mined from the Paleoproterozoic rocks around Tennant Creek since the early 1930s, there has been almost no mineral exploration in the covered rocks to the east of Tennant Creek in the 90 years since, according to MinEx CRC.

“The East Tennant drilling campaign was designed to test stratigraphic and structural interpretations and assess the mineral potential of basement rocks to the east of the Tennant Creek mineral field,” MinEx CRC CEO, Andrew Bailey, said. “These basement rocks are under-explored and concealed by hundreds of metres of younger sedimentary rocks.”

The drilling campaign is part of a world-first scientific drilling program, the NDI, designed to understand the evolution of the Australia continent, provide clues about where to search for new mineral deposits and bring forward the next generation of mineral exploration technology, MinEx CRC says.

Included within the NDI campaign was a 1,750m drill hole (known as NDI Carrara 1) at a location near the Northern Territory/Queensland border, around 250 km northwest of Mount Isa. This hole was designed to capture geological and stratigraphic information from a previously unknown sedimentary basin, and to assess the basin for potential to host energy and mineral resources.

In collaboration with Geoscience Australia and geological survey organisations in every state and territory, the NDI will manage and deliver a seven-year program with multiple drilling campaigns spread across Australia.

Results from the drilling program have uncovered a range of igneous and metasedimentary rocks, enabled a better understanding of the structure and stratigraphy of the area and helped to refine pre-drilling interpretations of the region’s prospectivity, according to the collaborative project.

Drilling has also provided pinning points to constrain cover thickness, with prospective basement typically concealed beneath less than 200 m of Georgina Basin sediments and less than 30 m of Cambrian basalt of the Kalkarindji Suite.

Geoscience Australia’s Chief of Minerals, Energy and Groundwater Division, Dr Andrew Heap, said: “We are proud to be a participant of the MinEx CRC through our Exploring for the Future program, which identified the region as a highly-prospective frontier. The drilling results are confirming this view and will support the continued development of the Barkly Region.

“A range of detailed analyses are planned to comprehensively characterise the drill core, which will provide insights into the geological evolution and mineral systems potential of the region. These results will be released throughout 2021.”

Dr Heap added: “Projects like this reveal the geology underneath the vast sedimentary cover that extends across most of Australia and open up frontier regions for exploration and resource discovery. In the future, the new geological knowledge and methods that we’ve used here can be applied in other similar prospective geological terranes across the country.”

Ian Scrimgeour, Executive Director NT Geological Survey, said the East Tennant NDI drill core provides an exciting opportunity to understand the potential of the underexplored Barkly area.

“The range of ancillary datasets that have been acquired during the drilling campaign, coupled with the ongoing research activities on the drill core, will transform the understanding of minerals systems in the region,” he said.

“NTGS is delighted to provide value-add datasets with the acquisition of hyperspectral data and high-resolution imaging of the drill core through our HyLogger instrument.”

The MinEx Cooperative Research Centre was established to:

  • Develop more productive, safer and environmentally friendly drilling methods to discover and drill-out deposits, including coiled tubing drilling technology;
  • Develop new technologies for collecting data while drilling, bringing forward mine production; and
  • Implement an NDI – a world-first collaboration of geological surveys, researchers and industry that will undertake drilling in under-explored areas of potential mineral wealth in Australia.

Monadelphous pockets more WA iron ore, nickel work with Rio and BHP

Base metals, Equipment maintenance, Mine operation news, Mineral project development, Mining services, Steel and iron ore, , , , , , , , , ,

Engineering company Monadelphous Group says it has secured new construction and maintenance contracts with both Rio Tinto and BHP, with a combined value of around A$60 million ($44 million).

The company has been awarded three three-year master services contracts with Rio Tinto for the delivery of sustaining capital projects across various mine sites and port operations throughout the Pilbara region in Western Australia (stockyard machines at Rio’s West Angelas iron ore operation, pictured), it said.

This work includes structural, mechanical and piping, electrical, instrumentation and controls, and non-process infrastructure projects.

Monadelphous also secured a three-year contract, with a two-year extension option, with Rio Tinto to provide mechanical, electrical and access maintenance services for fixed plant shutdowns at Rio’s Gove alumina operations in the Northern Territory of Australia.

In addition, Monadelphous secured a 12-month extension to its existing mechanical and electrical maintenance, shutdown and project services contract across BHP’s Western Australian nickel operations.

RUC Cementation, GR Engineering plan to collaborate on Tanami Expansion work

Bulk handling, Mine operation news, Mine shafts and equipment, Mineral project development, Mining services, Precious metals, , , , , , , , , , , ,

RUC Cementation Mining Contractors and GR Engineering Services have agreed to team up as part of a plan to construct surface infrastructure, as well as complete the shaft lining and equipping for a proposed hoisting shaft at the Newmont-owned Tanami Expansion 2 project in the Northern Territory of Australia.

Today, Barry Upton (right), Managing Director of RUC Cementation Mining Contractors, and Geoff Jones (left, next to Rod Schier, Engineering Manager for GR Engineering), Managing Director of GR Engineering Services, signed this “Teaming Agreement”.

The surface infrastructure component the two plan to work on includes winders, headframe and surface conveyors.

The companies said: “Both companies have worked together to submit a competitive and technically strong offer for the works and look forward hopefully to an award in the near future.”

RUC added: “Whilst a departure from the traditional GR Engineering work scope of treatment plant construction, RUC Mining is very pleased to have GR on board as a key construction partner and values the excellence in construction that GRES bring.”

The Tanami Expansion 2 project is expected to increase the annual capacity of the processing site to 3.5 Mt/y, from 2.6 Mt/y, and extend the life of the mine beyond 2040.

Vimy senses Angulari gold-uranium project boost following TOMRA XRT trial

Comminution of minerals, Energy minerals, Mineral processing, Mineral project development, Mining project news, Mining services, Precious metals, , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Ore sorting test work from TOMRA Sorting Australia has Vimy Resources thinking about higher grades, lower capital and operating costs, and the production of precious metals at its majority-owned Angulari uranium-gold deposit in Australia’s Northern Territory.

The ASX-listed company, which has defined an inferred mineral resource estimate of 26 Mlbs of U3O8 (0.91 Mt at 1.3% U3O8) at Angulari, already thought the deposit, part of the Alligator River project, had potential to fit into the first quartile of the global uranium cost curve, but now it has eyes on further improving its cost position.

An ore sorting proof of concept trial conducted by TOMRA using its COM X-ray Transmission Tertiary system factored in a 41.5 kg sample that was obtained from mineralised material collected from drill core that Cameco Australia drilled in 2011 and 2016.

The trial on this material saw the uranium concentrate grade increase from 1.2% to 2% U3O8 (70% increase) with high U3O8 recovery. Alongside this, the sample gold concentrate grade increased from 0.7 g/t to 1.1 g/t (47% increase). On the latter gold work, Vimy said: “This warrants further investigation given no gold processing or recovery test work has been undertaken to date.”

The test work also showed that gold mineralisation is spatially coincident with the uranium mineral resource within the sample.

Some 13.5 kg of this 41.5 kg sample was not sorted due to the high uranium grade, which provides additional upside in future trials, Vimy noted. Other potential by-products were also identified, including platinum and palladium.

All of this bodes well for cutting the capital and operating costs that Vimy was unable to disclose to investors as part of its December 2018 scoping study on the project.

A higher feed grade from ore sorting would likely result in lower operating costs, the company said.

Meanwhile, smaller hydrometallurgical plant circuits would likely be required for the same level of production. Coupled with a potential reduction in acid-consuming phases in the concentrate, ore sorting has the potential to lower reagents (and water) usage and costs on a per lb U3O8 produced basis, noting that expected reagent use is already low, Vimy said.

“A smaller plant would result in a lower overall disturbance footprint with commensurate approvals and capital cost benefits,” it added.

Mike Young, CEO of Vimy, said, “The results of the TOMRA ore sorting trial at the Alligator River project’s Angularli deposit have exceeded our expectations. The high-grade nature of the deposit, coupled with the ore sorting outcomes, enhances the prospect of Angularli’s potential future development as a low-cost uranium operation.

“Our next step is to progress the upgrade trials and investigate the potential for the recovery of high value by-products associated with the uranium mineralisation at the Angularli deposit.”

The Angularli deposit is located in the King River-Wellington Range tenement group which is managed in a joint venture (Vimy 79%: Rio Tinto 21%) with Rio Tinto Exploration Pty Ltd, a wholly owned subsidiary of Rio Tinto Ltd.