Canadian mining firm Trigon Metals has successfully produced its inaugural batch of sale-ready dried copper concentrate from the milling operations at the Kombat mine in Namibia. The mill at this mine boasts a processing capacity of 1,000 tons per day (tpd).
On August 21st, the company ran the mill at 44% of its capacity, processing approximately 436 tons of ore. Trigon Metals has ambitious plans to boost production capacity to 70% by the end of the coming month.
Trigon’s unique approach involved intentionally feeding the mill with lower-grade material, averaging 0.73% copper, extracted from waste materials identified by ore spotters. This strategy was adopted to showcase the efficiency of their process. Remarkably, the company achieved a concentrate grade of 33.5% with recoveries at 79.5%.
The resulting concentrate is expected to have a grade of 20%, and Trigon anticipates that recoveries will improve when using higher-grade feed. Higher-grade concentrates contribute to increased profitability and reduced treatment and shipping costs per unit of copper produced.
Currently, Trigon has amassed stockpiles of ore on run-of-mine pads, totaling 27,000 tons with an average copper content of 1.2%. This roughly equates to a one-month supply of ore feed.
Fanie Müller, Vice President of Operations at Trigon and Manager of the Kombat mine, expressed satisfaction with the mill’s performance, stating, “The mill is performing very well. This level of efficiency on our starter feed puts us in an excellent position as we start to feed our target grades.”
Recently, the company secured $8.9 million in financing from Epiroc Financial Solutions, which will be used for the acquisition of underground mining equipment to facilitate the resumption of operations at the Kombat mine.
May also be interesting: “The European Twilight: What’s Ahead for the Global Zinc Market” 
