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Volume 4, Thursday November 6th, 2008
Who says nothing interesting happens in Roxby!
BHP fi rms timetable B HP Billiton has set a date, subject to approvals, to commence digging an open-pit expansion as early as February 2010 which is just one month prior to the next State election.
In a release of a proposed timeline by the company, the environmental impact statement (EIS) will be presented to the Government before the end of 2008 with a release to the public in April or May 2009. There are five planned stages of the expansion of which the first is to optimise the existing underground operations which would considerably increase the mines production capacity to 200,000 tonnes of copper, 4,500 tonnes of uranium and 120,000 ounces of gold. The underground phases will not have to undertake the same onerous approval process for the first-stage expansion of the existing underground mine.
Once digging commences on the open pit it will then take 4 to 5 years removing a million tonnes a day of overburden to reach the ore. The open pit mine will have a 100-year project and will create a hole 1.22 kilometres deep and 6.5 kilometres long. BHP has already begun marketing the uranium production and has signed 10 term sheets with customers in Europe, the US and Asia. “The aggregate market interest is well in excess of the first phase expansion tonnage,” John Crofts, the chief commercial officer of BHP’s uranium division, said yesterday. He said BHP would put in place uranium sales contracts before making an expansion decision, with a pricing mechanism to capture a fair market price at the time of delivery. One of the most contentious issues has been how much ore will be processed at Olympic Dam and how much would be exported as concentrate. The company has said eighty percent of the ura-
nium would be processed at Olympic Dam and twenty percent exported as concentrate. The issue of where the ore will be processed is politically sensitive in South Australia, which wants the expansion to provide as many jobs as possible for the state’s residents. The company also said that, 350,000 tonnes of copper will be processed in an expanded smelter at Olympic Dam and the remaining 380,000 tonnes will be shipped to China in concentrate. “The ultimate aim is to get a smelter in China,” said BHP spokesman Peter Ogden. “It would be a new smelter. We would have a minority stake in it.” Consistent with previous briefings the company was tight lipped on the costs of the expansion which some analysts say could cost up to $AUD 30 billion dollars. Olympic Dam is one of the richest mines in the world and a report by Deloitte says the mine will increase the States gross product by nine percent
by 2024. The report did not mention any details of the town’s expansion. Previous presentations have spoken of an additional 1000 homes, expanded school, upgraded sporting facilities, health and policing services to name just few of the infrastructure projects that will be needed to be rushed forward to meet the demands of the town’s fast growth to a population of 8,000 residents. Two of the most immediate infrastructure projects will be the building of a construction camp for 8000 contractors, and the new airport which will have the capacity for 737’ jets and night flying. The release of the proposed timetable and the company’s intentions will be of some comfort to local resident’s, community groups and businesses that also need to plan for their own futures.