Processing deal allows Northam to launch its Eland plans
The agreement with Jubilee brings a base load to the concentrator and allows Northam to kickstart its own plans at the Eland complex
Northam Platinum has secured the first platform it needs to extract platinum group metals from the mothballed Eland mine it has bought from Glencore by agreeing a processing deal with Jubilee Metals. Northam bought Eland for R175m in February 2017, but apart from studying what the best option for the mine and concentrator was in a weak platinum market, it had done little with the asset since then. The agreement with Jubilee brings a base load to the concentrator and allows Northam to kickstart its own plans at the Eland complex. Northam CEO Paul Dunne has stated there are no immediate plans to restart the underground mine, bringing additional ounces to the market at this stage, but he has spoken of a possible tailings retreatment operation to begin extracting value from the complex. Jubilee will underpin that strategy not only with 60,000 tonnes a month of material from its PlatCro business but also possibly from its Hernic tailings treatment operation close to Eland. The Hernic pro...
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