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Diamondcorp commissions conveyor belt at Lace

Published: 07:43 13 Oct 2015 BST

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The belt will result in a significant reduction in the cost per tonne to load and haul rock.

DiamondCorp (LON:DCP) has commissioned the underground conveyor belt at its lace mine in South Africa.

The belt has a capacity of 400 tonnes per hour, but due to water constraints the mining rate at Lace is 1,200,000 tonnes per annum or 200 tonne per hour.

From November, all future kimberlite and development waste will be conveyed to the surface rather than carried by trucks.

"This will result in a significant reduction in the cost per tonne to load and haul rock," said Paul Loudon, DiamondCorp’s chief executive, who added the commissioning of the conveyor belt was a milestone for the development.

Efforts now have turned to reducing water consumption, he added, using a de-grit circuit, X-rays and waste sorting technology. 

A de-grit circuit has already been installed and commissioned in the plant.

The removal of the sand fraction will reduce water consumption in the processing plant by 50%.

In combination, the de-grit circuit and waste sorting technology may enable Lace to be mined at a significantly faster rate than currently planned.

Small diamonds that will be lost in the sand are seen as only marginally economic, while a reduction in the recovered grade per tonne of diamonds will be offset by a proportional increase in the dollar per carat and lower processing costs, DiamondCorp said. 

On sales, because progress at Lace has been slower than anticipated the company will wait until it has more diamonds before selling them.

To date, 4,250 carats have been recovered from bulk testing, less than planned due to difficult ground conditions, and the company said it will wait until its gets at least 10,000 carats as larger parcels attract better prices.

An independent valuation in Antwerp has estimated diamond sales should average between US$140 and $160 per carat at a 1.00mm cut off and between $160 and $200 per carat at a 1.25mm bottom screen size. This did not include the potential for very large stones to be uncovered.

MPH Consulting in Toronto is working on an updated resource statement and has requested two additional microdiamond samples and one more 180m underground delineation core drill hole. 

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