JOHANNESBURG, Jun. 24, 2010 Coal production at Aim-listed Beacon Hill Resources' Minas Moatize project, in Mozambique's Tete province, would increase to 8 000 t/m now that refurbishment work on the underground mine had been completed.
Beacon Hill's 49%-owned BHR Mining subsidiary bought the project from mining investment firm Borneo Mining SA for $35-million, in April.
Prior to the underground refurbishment, the mine was producing at a rate of about 2 500 t/m of coal.
Excavation work that was currently under way would further increase production by an additional 120 000 t over the next 12 months, the resources company added in a statement, following its annual general meeting on Thursday.
This would provide Beacon Hill with increased production and increased cash flow in the short term, while the company works towards boosting output at the mine to two-million-tons-a-year of saleable coal from four-million-tons-a-year run-of-mine by 2012.
Minas Moatize, which was located in one of the largest undeveloped coking coal regions in the world, the Tete province, had an estimated resource of 33-million tons of coal. The resources company was hoping to develop the mine into a large, opencast operation capable of producing coking and thermal coal for the domestic and export markets.
Beacon Hill believed that coking coal would be among the most highly sought after commodities in the next decade and beyond.
Meanwhile, the company reported that the application process for a mining lease for its Arthur River magnesite project, which was submitted to Mineral Resources Tasmania in December last year, was in its final stages.
Beacon Hill was planning to start production at the project by the end of next year.
Progress had also been made in terms of a development proposal and an environmental management plan for the project, stated Beacon Hill.
Further drilling would also be undertaken to improve the project's current measured and inferred resource of 39-million tons of magnesite.
Beacon Hill held two retention licences over magnesite deposits in North West Tasmania in the Arthur River and Lyons River areas.
