Mine excursion
running smoothly. Production at Elandspruit is
just over three million tonnes per annum.
According to Tshithavhane, a contractor at
Elandspruit — IPP Materials Handling — is
currently mining four faces. “These faces are mined
concurrently so that we can optimise the operation,
and it allows us to get an economical line to the
processing plant,” says Tshithavhane. Basically,
each face targets a different seam and produces
the product that is in demand or that a specific
client has ordered. At Elandspruit, Wescoal
mines all five coal seams. This method allows
the mine to run a continuous stream of products
through its plant, which is about 20km from the
Elandspruit pit. Furthermore, Tshithavhane says
that Wescoal is expanding onto the neighbouring
land and finalising a toll and wash agreement.
“This will give us an opportunity to increase our
processing capacity without any additional capital
requirements,” he says.
Accessing the correct seams
The coal at Elandspruit is mined from an open
pit and from underground. Seam 1 is reached
by an underground decline. All the other seams
(two to five) are accessed from the open pit. “In
order to maximise value from the resource, we
synchronise the underground and opencast mine
to ensure that when the opencast is mined out, we
are not left with just the underground operation,”
adds Tshithavhane. The strip ratio in the open
pit is on average about 2.7. The mine uses 30
articulated dump trucks (ADTs) for haulage and
10 excavators in the open pit.
Baat Leonard, mine manager at Elandspruit,
explains that the mining team is currently
unearthing coal from Seam 4. Seam 5 is the
shallowest, but it does not outcrop everywhere
at Elandspruit. On the high wall, the different
seams can be clearly distinguished. Nine metres
below Seam 4, Seam 3 (which Leonard says is
high-quality coal) is exposed, and approximately 15
metres underneath that, Seam 2, which occurs in a
band of close to six metres wide. Seam 4 and Seam
3 are also corroded in many places on the property
and do not occur everywhere. Right at the bottom,
not more than one metre of Seam 1 is visible,
which is mainly mined underground. Tshithavhane
explains that coal from the different seams is
stockpiled separately but blended if required. The
highwall is about 45m in height, the pit is between
40m and 60m deep, and the total mine area is
2.5km wide and 9km in length. There is thus still
significant room to expand the open pit.
Processing in the basin
Elandspruit is located almost in the epicentre
of the Witbank coal basin — the greatest
coalfield yet to be discovered on the African
continent. Although compact in comparison to
the one or two remaining mammoth open pits
on its doorstep, the four seams underlying the
Elandspruit license bear enough high-quality coal
to ensure a profitable operation. The mine is about
3km west of Middelburg and is surrounded by
five or six different coal mines of various sizes, the
most notable being that of Swiss-based Glencore’s
Graspan Colliery. Elandspruit started delivering
coal to the processing plant in June 2016. The plant
is about 20km from the pit.
Making the plant work
According to Jaap Kruger, plant manager at
Elandspruit, Wescoal bought the processing
plant from Muhanga in October 2014. The plant
was built eight years ago and had an initial plant
feed capacity of a little more than 150 000tpm.
Muhanga’s mine (which was located next to the
plant) ran out of coal years ago, but rather than
dismantling the entire plant or building a new
plant closer to Elandspruit, Wescoal bought it
from Muhanga and decided to haul the mined
material from the Elandspruit pit to the plant
instead. The mine and the plant are linked via
national and provincial roads.
Various upgrades and modifications have been
made to the processing plant and it is now capable
of treating well in excess of 200 000tpm feed
material. As Wescoal expanded its operations,
a second beneficiation plant was sourced from
the Ermelo area and re-erected adjacent to the
processing plant. The additional plant produces
product mainly for the domestic-size coal market.
Currently, the coal mined from Elandspruit
Colliery’s open pit is sent to Eskom’s Tutuka
Power Station near Standerton in Mpumalanga,
as well as to the Majuba Power Station located
between Volksrust and Amersfoort, also in
Mpumalanga.
According to Kruger, both Tutuka and Majuba
require a specific product, which can be produced
by Wescoal at the plant. The ROM from different
seams is mixed in the plant and processed before
complying with the power stations’ specifications.
ROM for the domestic-size coal market is mined
selectively from Seam 1. It is mined from a portal
that enters the highwall of the open pit on the
southern side of the mine. There are four entries
for ventilation purposes, which also provides access
for workers and material.
Maximum value
Wescoal has certainly come a long way since
the early days of Khanyisa and Intibane, and
although their strategy is to maximise value from
existing assets, be sure that management would
not let a good deal slip through its fingers. It has
a five-year contract with Eskom at Elandspruit,
but will have to look further afield, or at
expansions, to honour another five-year contract.
Moabsvelden is an option, but the geology will
be a challenge. Expansions at Elandspruit and
Vanggatfontein is most likely to fill the gap, but
new acquisitions are probably the answer. b
JUNE 2018 MINING MIRROR
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