LONDON (Alliance News) - Kennedy Ventures PLC on Friday said its investee company African Tantalum (Pty) Ltd has continued to progress the plant upgrade at the Homestead project that forms part of the Tantalite Valley mine in Namibia.
Kennedy shares were up 7.2% to 3.75 pence per share on Friday morning.
The investment company said African Tantalum has progressed the upgrade as per management expectations and on schedule. Mining operations have continued during the plant upgrade programme, with development proceeding as expected and a sufficient stockpile of 4,000 tonnes of ore is now available for the plant to operate continuously.
The reorganisation of the plant modules has been completed together with the improvement and upgrade of a number of those modules. The milling circuit design is complete and the equipment for the pre-concentrate ore has been designed, manufactured and purchased.
Installation is ongoing, with the plant upgrade completion expected in the second quarter of 2017, improving the capacity to 15,000 tonnes per month from the current 7,500 tonnes.
"[African Tantalum] continues to assess the potential of the lepidolite lithium deposit as well as the occurrence of lithium in the other pegmatite bodies and both geological and metallurgical studies are in an advanced position," said Kennedy.
In addition, African Tantalum has appointed a new general manager to its operations, with Namibian citizen Renier Swiegers to start his role from last month.
By Joshua Warner; joshuawarner@alliancenews.com; @JoshAlliance
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