9th Oct 2015 10:43
LONDON (Alliance News) - StratMin Global Resources PLC shares rose on Friday after it said it has placed the processing plant at its Loharano project in Madagascar into 24-hour production after a month-long test period hit all of the company's targets.
StratMin shares were up 14% to 5.70 pence per share on Friday.
The plant at the project was taken through a refurbishment programme back in July. Since then production from the plant has "steadily increased", and at the end of August, the plant was placed into production for 24 hours a day.
Throughout September, the processing plant operated for 24 hours a day, six days a week, allowing for one day of planned maintenance, but the drying plant ran for seven days a week.
To put the plant's progression into context, in June before the refurbishment programme was undertaken, it produced 64 tonnes of graphite. In July when the refurbishment was undertaken it produced 38 tonnes, because the plant was closed to conduct the refurbishment.
But the plant then produced 67 tonnes in August before ramping up to 255 tonnes in September when it was put into 24-hour production.
During that test month, feed and processing rates were maintained at low levels with brief increases to test various scenarios. That identified two immediate areas for improvement which are being addressed by the company.
The first issue identified was falling grades due to inefficient milling. StratMin said it is "completing a mill upgrade" to resolve the issue.
The second problem was elevated moisture content in the graphite concentrate feed into the drying circuit was choking the throughput rate in the drier. That was caused by the dewatering spinners being overloaded and not removing enough water prior to the concentrate entering the drier. StratMin has ordered more spinners which are being shipped for "immediate installation", it said.
Separately, improved grade control in the mining operations showed immediate benefits, with the head grade (the grade of raw graphite ore entering the plant) improving from 5.6% to 7.2% graphite content over the month.
"With the success of the testing period, the operation can now move to extended twenty-four hour production, six days a week, and the team is being expanded to cater for permanent rostering," it said.
By Joshua Warner; [email protected]; @JoshAlliance
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