Dredging new life from dam
By KATH UZIALLO
THE North-West's mining boom continues, with a new venture at the old Hellyer Mine site commencing 24-hour operations last week and set to extract up to $50million of zinc per year .
The Hellyer Zinc Concentrate Joint Venture, operated by mainland companies Polymetals Ltd and Intec Ltd, is using a dredging process to recover zinc from old mine tailings.
The Hellyer mine, an hour south of Burnie, began operations in 1989 and closed in 2000 after ore supplies were exhausted.
Polymetals Hellyer Ltd general manager Andrew Platts said the venture had provided about 40 new jobs, with about two-thirds of the workforce having been employed at the Hellyer mine before it closed.
He said local construction workers were also employed earlier this year to refurbish the mill and build a new pump station and storage tanks.
Mr Platts said the venture was taking advantage of the world- wide demand for zinc and would operate for two to six years, depending on economic factors.
He said about 1.5million tonnes of fine tailings, containing 2.5percent zinc, would be dredged each year from the dam and pumped to the mill.
At the mill, the tailings would be reground and a flotation process used to recover mineral concentrate of 40percent zinc, 12percent lead and 220gramspertonne of silver.
"We aim to produce around 63,000 tonnes of this concentrate per annum. It will be trucked to Burnie Port and then shipped to Chinese smelter customers who will recover the respective metals."
Mr Platts said the value of the concentrate would be between $40million and $50million before operating costs.