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Tin in the News
Dear readers,In this edition of "Tin in the News" we comment on recent strikes by tin miners in Bolivia, opportunities for tin use as a result of potential new regulation of lead by the EU, as well as recent developments at the Granville and Cinovec tin projects.As a reminder for everyone planning to attend ITRI's upcoming Asia Tin Summit from 12th-15th September, please note that discounted early bird registration ends 31 July. More information is available below and through this link.Tom Mulqueen - Manager, Markets |
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Asia Tin Summit to explore China sustainability initiatives
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24 July: Key speakers from China will provide their insight on a number of sustainability topics to be addressed at ITRI’s upcoming Asia Tin Summit in Kunming, with presentations from government regulatory body ASQIQ and the Kunming University of Science and Technology, who will detail China’s conflict minerals standards as well as recent developments in sustainable tin smelting technology.Sustainability is becoming an increasingly important issue for the tin industry inside China, with greater expectation to demonstrate responsible sourcing of raw materials and to further limit the environmental impacts of mining and smelting operations. The progress being made in both areas will be outlined in these two expert presentations.AQSIQ (General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine of the People’s Republic of China) is a ministerial-level government department which has been directly involved in setting and enforcing conflict minerals regulation in China and Kunming University of Science is one of the top research institutions for minerals science in China, notable for its close links to the minerals industry in Yunnan.The 2017 Asia Tin Summit is expected to attract some 300 delegates from China and the rest of the world. Click here to download the Programme.Early Booking rate ends 31st July 2017! Delegates registering and paying in full before the 31st July are entitled to greatly discounted attendance fees. Click here to visit the event website for further information and to register.
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Bolivian miners resist Comibol restructuring plan
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21 July: Miners at Bolivia's state-owned Huanuni tin mine have halted production in a dispute over a planned restructuring of Bolivia's umbrella state mining company, Comibol, local news sources have reported.A government proposal for the restructuring of Comibol has come under strong resistance generally from the mining sector in Bolivia, with workers unions believe the restructuring will result in a reduction of social benefits by governance under a public labour law rather than the general labour rules which provide current employment rights. The Bolivian mining ministry rejects this claim and insists that the intention is to change the current Comibol model whereby the organisation is financed by providing leases to cooperatives and private partnerships to a model of greater control and oversight by the government.The workers at Huanuni are striking because they believe the proposals will result in cuts to the workforce as well as a 3% increase in electricity rates, according to the general secretary of the Huanuni mine workers union, Elias Colque. Workers at Huanuni are also unhappy that the government has yet to agree to an acceptable pay rise for them this year with the union claiming no perceivable pay increase has been agreed for over five years. A 2017 supreme decree outlined Bolivian mine workers were eligible for a 7% salary increase subject to performance conditions.ITRI View: Huanuni produced 6,460 tonnes of tin in 2016, down 25% from 8,574 tonnes in 2015 according to official government statistics. The weaker performance last year was largely a result of drought in the region and ageing processing infrastructure at the mine. There are no reports of production halts at the Colquiri tin and zinc mine, where Comibol has already signed labour agreements with unions about the planned restructuring. However, strikes at Huanuni and wider unrest in the Bolivian mining sector show that dispute over the proposal has clearly reached a critical point. The extent to which the production halt will impact on Bolivian tin output will depend on the nature and length of industrial action, something that is not currently clear.
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Tin to be impacted by EU lead restrictions?
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21 July: The European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) has been asked to submit a report on the restriction of lead in hunting shot due to ongoing concerns about toxicity and its impact on wildlife, which could boost the use of tin in alloys as an alternative.The hunting shot market in the EU is fragmented between lead, steel, tungsten and bismuth shot although there is no data detailing the breakdown of each type in the EU. Tin is not used in isolation but rather alloyed with bismuth and tungsten to produce hunting shot for use in wetlands. Several EU countries have already banned lead shot voluntarily.The EU’s Risk Assessment Committee (RAC) will reach an opinion on proposals included in the final report in March 2018 and Socio-Economic Committee (SEAC) will send their opinions to the European Commission later in the year, which could result in an expansion of restrictions on the use of lead, specifically on its use or possession in wetlands as a minimum standard.ITRI View: The likely further restriction of lead shot will support the use of alternatives, which should have a positive impact on the volume of tin consumed in this niche area. The EU is also exploring further regulation on lead use in other areas relevant to tin, with restrictions on the sale of PVC articles containing lead compounds as stabilisers in concentrations greater than 0.1% proposed in a recent ECHA report. However, the phase-out of lead stabilisers in the EU is already complete having been replaced primarily by calcium based stabilisers. It is therefore unlikely that restriction of lead stabilisers in existing PVC articles will have any significant impact on the volume of tin stabilisers used in the production of PVC.
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Approvals granted for Granville expansion
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14 July: Australian tin producer and project developer, Aus Tin Mining, has announced that it has received formal approval from Tasmania's West Coast Council for the expansion of its Granville Tin Project in Tasmania. This removes a significant hurdle for a resumption of mining at the site.The company has already been producing tin concentrate by processing tailings material and ore stocks at Granville but has been limited by existing user rights which restrict annual processing to 2,500 tonnes of ore. The new approval increases this limit to 40,000 tonnes of ore as well as being able to resume mining at the high-grade Granville East Mine where previous exploration work by the company has indicated near surface grades exceeding 2% Sn from several boreholes. The expansion itself is projected to result in an increase in tin output to 550 tpa of tin-in-concentrate; at a cash cost of A$15,600 per tonne of tin (around US$12,000 per tonne).Remaining requirements for expansion include construction of waste rock emplacements at the mine and a new tailings storage facility at the current processing plant as well as submission of operating plans to various regulators, which Aus Tin hopes to finalise by the end of this quarter.CEO, Peter Williams said, "the Granville Expansion is an important milestone that will enable the Company to resume mining at the high-grade tin Granville East Mine, and provides the platform from which the Company can generate cash flow to fund its portfolio of projects."ITRI View: Aus Tin has recently secured a $3.25M funding package to finance implementation of the approved expansion at Granville as well as development work at Taronga, the company's tin project in New South Wales, for which a development application for a trial mine and pilot plant is currently being progressed. Both Granville and Taronga are good examples of how a staged approach to project development is reducing investment risk by seeking to confirm the technical viability of the process flow sheet at low capital cost through smaller-scale pilot plant testing and trial mining.
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Maiden ore reserve reported for Cinovec
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14 July: European Metals Holdings Limited has reported a maiden ore reserve for its Cinovec Lithium-Tin Project in the Czech Republic.The JORC-compliant probable ore reserve is based on a Preliminary Feasibility Study (PFS) completed in April this year and totals 34.5 million tonnes of ore containing 0.30% lithium and 0.09% tin, or 103,500 tonnes of lithium and 31,050 tonnes of tin contained, as well as smaller volumes of tungsten.The project was envisaged in a recent 2017 PFS as an underground mine operation operating over a mine life of 21 years. It is projected to process an average of 1.7 Mtpa of ore and 20,800 tonnes of battery-grade lithium during the period of operation as well as producing tin and tungsten concentrates as by-products. Capital costs for the project are estimated at $393 million.ITRI View: While the PFS does not specify estimated tin output over this 21-year mine life it has highlighted the recovery of tin from waste streams as an important source of revenue. Based on the annual ore processing estimates and assuming 65% tin recovery, we estimate potential tin-in-concentrate production of some 1,000tpa, lower than the 4,200tpa figure suggested in the company's conceptual scoping study for the project published in 2015.
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