LONDON (Alliance News) - Wolf Minerals Ltd on Thursday said it had made good progress at the Drakelands open pit mine in Devon, having completed the installation of external steel columns around the processing plant and completed a ten hole diamond drilling programme at the site.
The specialty metals producer said it has mined more than 1.6 million tonnes or ore to date at the site in southwest England, with recent months seeing a strong performance thanks to favourable weather. Wolf Minerals added that good progress has also been made with its mining waste facility, with the liner for the next stage at the facility completed on schedule earlier this month.
With the aim of tailoring the ore feed for the processing plant closer to the design feed characteristics, Wolf Minerals said a ten hole diamond drilling program was recently completed in the open pit to gather additional data on particle size and the distribution of mineralisation within the ore body, with the ore samples currently being analysed.
Meanwhile processing plant testing highlighted a number of areas for improvement, the company said, as it works towards commercial production at the facility. As part of this, installation of external steel columns around the processing plant have been completed to reduce the generation of low frequency noise, Wolf Minerals said.
The company noted that it is currently in discussions regarding orders of tungsten concentrate, which it was unable to meet due to the underperformance of its processing plant, and said the contract terms have been extended until the shortfall is supplied and a penalty price is activated. Wolf Minerals is looking to reduce or defer this penalty, it said.
Shares in Wolf Minerals were down 0.8% at 5.95 pence on Thursday.
By Hannah Boland; hannahboland@alliancenews.com; @Hannaheboland
Copyright 2016 Alliance News Limited. All Rights Reserved.
