FROM MINING NEWSNickel miners upbeat despite price plummet...

FROM MINING NEWS

Nickel miners upbeat despite price plummet

Charlotte Dudley
Monday, 26 May 2008

WHILE three-month nickel tumbled 7% to $US23,500 per tonne, nickel miners and explorers used the Association of Mining and Exploration Companies (AMEC) National Mining Congress in Perth last week to showcase the merits of their projects and operations, corporate credentials and processing technologies.

First up was Perth-based Heron Resources whose managing director Matthew Longworth spruiked the upside of the Kalgoorlie Nickel and Yerilla projects and also highlighted his company’s efforts in sonic drilling, beneficiation and atmospheric leaching.

Longworth said the emerging atmospheric leaching technique (acquired through Heron’s association with BHP Billiton and applied at the new Ravensthorpe mine), had “derisked many of the key geotechnical areas associated with heap leaching” and would help Heron’s Yerilla project, north of Kalgoorlie, reach its nickel output target of around 20,000 tonnes.

Atmospheric leaching involves a laboratory set-up of elevated atmospheric temperature vessels, heating plates and sulphuric acid reactions, which Heron said had the potential to process lower-grade material.

Touting the high-grade nickel of its flagship Flying Fox mine and the potential of the Spotted Quoll deposit, Western Areas’ managing director Julian Hanna said the company planned to produce 35,000 tonnes of nickel by 2011 from a total of five mines.

Overviewing the credentials of the Spotted Quoll deposit, Hanna said there was “clearly potential for a significant underground mine” with ongoing drilling in progress.

And while Hanna conceded its Diggers South – currently in feasibility stage – was “not as flash as Flying Fox or Spotted Quoll”, he said it was a good asset to have.

The third and final nickel presentation, from Perth-based miner Sally Malay, opened the floor with an overview of its 2007 “milestone” year.

Company business development manager Wade Evans talked up last year’s Deacon orebody discovery, the company’s bumper second half year profits and the Northern Ore zone discovery at the company’s namesake mine.

Conceding a lack of follow-up exploration at the company’s Lanfranchi mine near Kambalda, Evans confirmed Sally Malay’s plan to spend around $10 million on exploration at the mine this year in an effort to extend the mineralisation.

Summed up Evans, “Sally Malay this year is forecast to produce about 14,000 tonnes of nickel. Our hope is to grow to a company that can produce 20,000 tonnes of nickel per annum for the next 10 years.”