On-The-Air (02/12/2016)

2nd December 2016

By: Martin Creamer

Creamer Media Editor

  

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Every Friday morning, SAfm’s AMLive’s radio anchor Sakina Kamwendo speaks to Martin Creamer, publishing editor of Engineering News and Mining Weekly.  Reported here is this Friday’s At the Coalface transcript:

Kamwendo: Patrice Motsepe’s new bank is helping to fund a brand new mine being built in the Western Cape.

Creamer: We also hear Patrice typecast in mining, it was African Rainbow Minerals, ARM as we called it. Now we are going to have to look at African Rainbow Capital, the bank that Patrice is doing work with. We see among his early investments is one in a brand new mine in the Western Cape.

It is a phosphate mine and he is taking about 30% of it from the Africa Rainbow Capital point of view. The main investor is a company called Kropz putting a total of R1.35-billion in to the phosphates mine. A phosphates mine that competes with public corporation Foskor, which is owned by the government and produces the phosphates and phosphoric acid at Richards Bay. This company will be at Saldanha Bay, although it is called Elandsfontein Phosphate mine, don't confuse it with Elandsfontein down here.

This is Elandsfontein in the Western Cape near Saldanha Bay and the ideal will be to export this phosphate to South America, India and Australia. They will begin producing in the first quarter of next year. They have come in for a lot of criticism, because of the location of the mine. It is pretty close to SA National Parks and also Langebaan Lagoon and close to a heritage site on the west coast.

There was criticism and among the critics was Trevor Manuel. He addressed the Joburg Indaba saying is this mine being put in the right place. This was the way mines can develop these days. It is a win-win situation and you can see that this particular operation at Elandsfontein is putting its best foot forward. They are just talking environment in everything they do. They are going to mine in different ways so that they rehabilitate while they mine.

They will be cutting in much smaller 50 meter sections of mining area. Once they have finished mining there they will rehabilitate that, put the original vegetation back. So there is a huge consciousness. You can see they are already planning to go towards 2032. They are talking about a tourism hub there that they will create when they vacate the area. It is also great to have that there in the Western Cape.

All mines should be linked to tourism. When you go to Alaska and all these other places these mines become a tourist hub when they are finished. That is the way to do it and we can see now going ahead in the Western Cape a new phosphates mine.

Kamwendo: The platinum price has plunged so low that many platinum mines have fallen into the red.

Creamer: When you think of platinum mining it is very important to South Africa. It is a great metal and does so many magical things. It employs 136 000 directly and 450 000 indirectly. This is the entity we have really got to watch and you will see it is on a knife’s edge.

The international community has also got quantities of metal on surface already, so already mined. When you try and compete with a production that you have got to do because you have got to keep those mines ticking over, then your hand like in when you are playing cards, you have got a weak hand and they know you have got a weak hand.

They also know that you have got to play your hand, because you have got commitments. So, you can see the South Africans having to play this hand and play into a market where they know they are selling their product at below cost. In the meantime they have got to do it and hopefully there will be a turn soon.

We have seen in the past a big spike in the price, which is not always advisable, but that is possibly what we are heading for as this pressure builds up in platinum.

Kamwendo: I know where you are going to be next Friday, because a top-level discussion on fuel-cells is due to take place at CSIR next Friday

Creamer: Yes and fuel-cells is something we should really be promoting, because again it is close to platinum. Without that catalyst, you cannot have the electricity generation and the heat generation and the water that comes from these fuel cells.

They are really important 21st century power drivers with no emissions at all. It is pollution free, noiseless and you can see these fuel cells going in to so many more things now like buses, cars, forklifts, trucks, households. There is going to be a big meeting at the CSIR on Friday chaired by Fahmida Smith from Impala Platinum.

We have got to give credit to Impala Platinum on the local front, they do a lot of promotion on fuel cell technology and we see even at their refinery they are coming off-grid. In other words they won’t take power from Eskom. They are planning to actually generate their own fuel cell power and their forklifts running around there are all driven by fuel cells.

Now we will have this big debate at the CSIR bringing in people from the UK, US, Department of Trade and Industry and the Public Investment Corporation, which could be an investor.

Kamwendo: Thanks very much. Martin Creamer is publishing editor of Engineering News and Mining Weekly.

Edited by Creamer Media Reporter

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