tin price wingellina, page-4

Centre, re trains-a bit back i put in a post about Wingellina and a big polymetallic mine being developed by Compass at Batchelor NT having some synergy. Compass will produce quite a lot of sulphur byproduct which could be input to the sulphuric acid process at Wingellina as one option. That production would need something like 10 wagons a day each way, to the NT border with SA where there is a stop just inside the NT. Thats good, no road tax. The Ghan does not have enough freight to be economic right now, so this would help a bit there. The concentrate could go back up on the same wagons to Darwin then back down to Batchelor siding the other way. Its about an 800k round trip to W from the railhead, dirt most of the way, but its pretty flat country. Road train haulage to the rail. That would cut a lot of ton miles off the bitumen, rail is more efficient mechanically/fuel etc due to much lower rolling resistance and scale economy on rail(if not administravely sometimes)than road haulage. eg. One train driver can haul what it would take hundreds of trucks with drivers to do. In the US they often just roll the loaded trailers onto flatcars and roll them off the other end on other prime movers. Saves handling. Faster. Dont think the Ghan has any tunnels on that route. Height of load not a big problem. The wagons would probably hook on the back of the passenger train. THose big diesels can haul and from memory sulphur is very light. Might need to be well sealed etc.