B
&E International opened its
Kusile Quarry in 2011 to cater for
the aggregate requirements of
the construction of Kusile Power
Station and ancillary works. In October
last year, B&E started operations at its
Howards Quarry, located south of the N4
between the Balmoral and Highveld Steel
offramps. The quarry is a source of high-
quality dolerite — the largest in the region
— making it ideally suited to supply not
only the ongoing works at Kusile, but also
the numerous road and rail projects in the
area. While dolerite is highly sought after
by the construction industry, particularly
for infrastructure projects in both civils
and mining, good dolerite sources are
being systematically depleted, resulting in
a shortage of quality aggregates.
Quarry manager André Kamfer explains
that the Howards Quarry was established
on the footprint of an existing quarry, with
the intention of supplying contractors
at Kusile as well as project contractors
in the surrounding area — particularly
those involved in road building and civils
infrastructure projects. “The licence
holder for the previous quarry actually
approached us when they were done here,
and knowing that we both had limited space
and remaining life at Kusile Quarry, we
applied for a mining right here, but for a
much bigger area than the original quarry,”
Kamfer says.
“One of the main reasons we decided to
open this quarry is because we knew there
were going to be a lot of projects in the
area: the mine has to open to supply Kusile,
there’s a number of big road projects in
the area, including a planned road running
right through from Ogies, and there’s a
new railway coming in as well. And there is
still a lot of afterwork required for Kusile,”
says Kamfer. He explains that large dolerite
deposits such as the one being mined at
Howards Quarry are uncommon for the
region, and the quarry is bordered by
sandstone, quartzite, and coal.
Although the quarry officially started
operations in October last year, Kamfer
explains that they actually started work
on site earlier than that. “About 18 months
prior, I told the guys that January 2016
would be the final month of operation for
Kusile Quarry, and then I would need a plant
up here and running. So, we actually started
cleaning the site and pouring the concrete
works for the plant in around February last
year, and then we started up operations in
October, so it was very quick.”
B&E has been involved in the quarrying
industry for many decades, with a focus
on contract-specific quarry operations.
20 _ QUARRY SA | SEPTEMBER 2017
The excavators — Volvo machines, like most of the quarry’s fleet
— have been operating for around 20 000 hours.
“Historically, we have tended to operate
on limited-duration contracts for specific
products,” explains Kamfer. “So for example,
for the N1 contract, we would get a licence
and crush in small increments ahead of the
contract, about 300 000 tonnes at a single site,
and then move onto the next one. Currently,
we have three commercial quarries,
excluding Kusile: Howards Quarry, Willows,
and then one in Bela Bela in Botswana.”
According to Kamfer, the size of the
current pit is 150m by 250m (37 500m 2 ),
with a maximum depth of 30m to 40m.
The pit is 380m by 580m (220 400m 2 ), with
a projected depth of 80m to 90m. “This is
dolerite all the way down, and based on the
size of the new quarry, the projected life of
mine is about 20 years,” adds Kamfer. “I’ve
even drilled down to 127m on the one side
of the quarry for the borehole, and it was
dolerite throughout.”
Kamfer and his team do their own
drilling and blasting, using around six to
eight tonnes of explosives for each blast.
Howards Quarry aims to blast about once a
month, unless demand dictates otherwise.
Built-in flexibility
Established in 1972 as a drilling and blasting
specialist, B&E International diversified
into the mobile crushing sector with its
own mobile and static crushing division,
and has been designing and manufacturing
plants for in-house use since the 1980s. In
1993, it entered the mining services sector
and diversified further into bulk mining,
Howards Quarry uses a bespoke B&E International plant for crushing and screening,
and produces a vast range of products, from dump rock and gabion rock all the way
down to supersand.