Mining Magazine > Panorama > Sandvik uranium mine crusher order

Panorama

Six of Sandvik’s largest CH880 cone crushers are to be installed at the greenfield Trekkopje uranium mine project in Namibia. The order follows the delivery of six similar crushers to the Tati nickel mine in Botswana in 2007.

The uranium project, owned by French energy group Areva, is a large, low-grade uranium field that consists of two deposits; the Trekkopje deposit and the Klein Trekkopje deposit, located approximately seven kilometres apart. The mine is expected to become one of the world’s ten largest uranium mines when fully commissioned and will also be one of the top five low-cost open-pit uranium operations in the world.

The Sandvik crushers will be used to process 100,000t/d of ore from an open-pit operation situated 65km inland from the coastal town of Swakopmund. The machines will be manufactured at a Sandvik plant in Sweden and delivered to the mine via the Namibian port of Walvis Bay, with installation scheduled for October this year.

The Trekkopje mine, which began producing uranium oxide in small quantities in 2009, is scheduled to reach full production by 2012. Ore removed from the pit will be transported to a mobile primary crusher, and then taken by conveyors to two Sandvik CH880 crushers for secondary crushing and to four CH880 crushers for tertiary crushing, to produce a final product size of 38mm. The material is then delivered to the agglomerators and heap leach pad.

According to Gavin Harries, regional sales manager for Africa at Sandvik Mining and Construction, Sandvik’s vast experience as a mining equipment supplier world-wide and the proven high productivity and reliability of the CH880 crushers were the main reasons that the company won the order.

“This is the first Sandvik order placed by Areva Mining in Africa and we are pleased to be one of the suppliers to the Trekkopje mine. Since Areva Mining is one of the biggest global companies in the field, this will be a reference of great importance for Sandvik as a mining equipment supplier,” Harries said.