RHA Tungsten mine gets estimates upgrade

Published: 18 September 2017

Zimbabwe's RHA Tungsten Project, under development, near Bulawayo has received has had its underground mineral resource estimates upgraded.

The RHA Tungsten mine is 49 percent owned by junior resources miner firm Premier Africa Resources and balance is owned by local empowerment indigenous partner.

The resource upgrade resulted in a 32 percent rise in the underground Measured Resource category to 0, 029 million tonnes and a 52 percent increase in grade to 5, 45 kilogram (kg) WO3 per tonne.

The Underground Indicated Resource category increased by 33 percent to 0, 076 million tonnes while there was a 95 percent increase in grade to 6, 31kg WO3 per tonne.

There upgrade saw an 11 percent increase in overall underground grade to 4, 72kg WO3 per tonne and 16 percent increase in total underground Mineral Resource contained metal to 6 257 493 kg WO3.

Commenting on the development Premier African Resources CEO Mr George Roach said: "This increase in tonnes and grade of the underground Mineral Resources at RHA provides both higher confidence in these Mineral Resources at RHA and supports our long-term confidence in the mine.

"At the same time, the recent substantial increase in the price of APT to $310 – $325 per mt has reduced the breakeven throughput tonnage required from underground ore at the predicted resource grade to approximately 4 500 tonnes per month and increases potential profitability as and when plant optimisation completes and we are able to process at the higher throughput tonnages projected for later in Q4 this year," he said.

"Most importantly the reduced breakeven point can also be achieved without any feed from open pit operations and supports our determined efforts over the past year to bring RHA into continuous production.

"We have commenced an independent review of the open pit Mineral Resources and we will report further when this review is completed. With ongoing curtailment in supply of wolframite from China, we believe that RHA can become one of the larger producers."
- bh24