Independence Group (IGO) has awarded another contract for works at the Nova nickel-copper-cobalt operations in Western Australia. A $240 million contract has been awarded to Barminco for mining services, extending the company’s operations at the Nova mine.
Barminco, under this four-year contract with a two-year extension option, will undertake underground mining activities at the Fraser Range project, with works to include development and production mining.
Since the company began its operations at Nova, Barminco has extracted 2.4 million tonnes of ore and delivered 29 kilometres of underground development.
“We are proud to say that Barminco has been at Nova from the outset and it is very pleasing that we can continue our close association with the IGO through this long-term extension at Nova.
“Barminco has supported the Nova project’s transition from development, starting with excavation of the box-cut on Australia Day 2015, to production, delivering a successful first year of commercial production in the 2018 financial year,” Barminco Chief Executive Officer Paul Muller said.
Together with the mining services, Barminco will also be establishing a Technology Development Committee with IGO. This committee is going to help identify as well as implement innovative methods and technologies which can help advance productivity and safety in underground mining.
“Barminco has been an important partner in the development of Nova. With the majority of the capital development completed at Nova there is a focus on incremental operational and productivity improvements associated with stope mining activities. The four-year term, with the option to extend by two years, allow us to work together to unlock this value. Both Barminco and IGO are committed to mapping and implementing these productivity improvements through new technologies. The establishment of the technology committee is an important step towards this objective,” IGO’s Managing Director and CEO Peter Bradford said.
IGO has also recently awarded Zenith Energy to build a 6.7MW solar PV farm at the Nova operations, which is going to be integrated with the mine’s existing diesel power station.
The Nova nickel-copper-cobalt operations is located approximately 360 kilometres south east of Kalgoorlie.
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Source: Barminco; The West Australian; Australian Mining