Jubilee Metals, the diversified metals producer listed on the LSE’s AIM and the JSE’s AltX, reports that it is making excellent progress towards its goal of producing 25 kt of copper annually from its operations in Zambia.
The company’s strategy is aimed at duplicating in Zambia the success it has had with its chrome and PGM operations in South Africa. Report by ARTHUR TASSELL.
Founded over 20 years ago, Jubilee’s South African business is based on the processing of chromite reefs, overlooked by the industry due to their complexity and regarded as in-situ waste, as well as the retreatment of historical processed tails. In FY-2023 (to 30 June 2023), it produced 1.3 Mt of chrome concentrates – making it one of the largest chrome concentrate producers in the world – and 44 koz of PGMs.
It is now rolling out a similar strategy in Zambia, the only difference being that the end product is copper rather than chrome and PGMs. Copper production by the company from its Zambian operations totalled just under 3 000 tonnes in FY-2023. Guidance for FY-2024 is for 5 850 tonnes of copper.
Jubilee Metals established an operational footprint in Zambia in 2019 when it acquired the Sable multi-metal refinery in the historic mining centre of Kabwe from Glencore. Since then, it has also built a copper concentrator, the Roan concentrator, in Ndola on the Zambian Copperbelt.
In unlocking the value of its Zambian waste rock assets, Jubilee Metals is starting to deploy its innovative in-house modular technology which has already been proven at its chrome operations in South Africa. Low in capex and able to be constructed and commissioned within about eight months, the company’s copper processing modules – which produce concentrates – can cater for throughputs of 20 to 50 kt per month. Typically, they will act as ‘satellite’ plants to upgrade remote feed sources for further refining.
Jubilee Metals stresses that entirely different technology will be needed to process its Zambian tailings assets and says its technical team is working on a bespoke processing solution for this material. The latest laboratory scale test work has shown encouraging results that have exceeded Jubilee’s expectations and larger scale pilot trials are planned.
Jubilee Metals is currently in the process of upgrading both its Sable refinery and its Roan concentrator to expand Sable’s capacity from 14 kt of copper in cathode to 16 kt of copper contained in cathode and copper concentrates per annum. Roan will be able process multiple feed sources of oxide and sulphides simultaneously with a capacity of 13 kt per annum of copper contained in copper concentrates.
In its latest update on its Zambian activities, the company says that it has completed the manufacturing of the new front-end modular 50 kt per month unit for Roan which was designed by Jubilee’s Technical Services team in South Africa.
Jubilee also reports that it has undertaken optimisation initiatives at Roan alongside construction to maintain copper sulphide concentrate production at 50% of its current production capacity. Furthermore, these optimisation initiatives have performed well and have increased the copper sulphide concentrate’s copper content from 20% to above 25%.
These enhancements result in an increased revenue potential for the sale of copper sulphide concentrates in the market, while also ensuring Roan continues producing while awaiting the delivery of the new front-end module.
As regards the Sable refinery, Jubilee says it is well advanced with plans to expand the current copper sulphide concentrate circuit. This is in addition to the existing production of copper cathode from oxide ore. Engineering designs have progressed well and the company remains on track to commence construction later this year.
Jubilee also reports encouraging results from the Munkoyo project, which lies within 50 km of Sable and which will be a feed source for the Sable complex. The company announced in November last year that it had signed an off-take agreement with an existing mining company which owns the resource.
Approximately 80 kt of ROM material from Munkoyo has been trialled and refined at Sable indicating a copper ore grade of between 1.5 and 3% contained copper. In addition, Jubilee has undertaken initial exploration and aerial surveying of the licence area which has shown the potential for a new copper resource along a onekilometre strike.
Following this successful testing and the potential to delineate further resources, Jubilee has agreed an option to acquire the licence for up to US$1.5 million. The company says it is planning to construct an upgrading copper processing module at Munkoyo, for which it has already secured long-lead items. The modular upgrade plant construction and implementation is expected to take six months.
Also announced by Jubilee in November last year was what it calls its ‘Waste Rock Project’, a joint venture in which it is partnering with Abu Dhabi-based International Resources Holding RSC Limited (IRH). The JV will exploit what Jubilee describes as one of the largest copper waste rock assets on surface in Zambia.
Jubilee has recently completed an independent survey which indicates that the minimum amount of material at this project at surface is 260 Mt. Processing trials on the initial bulk samples from the project, undertaken at Jubilee’s development centre, have now been completed. The trials confirmed that the company can produce a high-grade copper concentrate through its modular copper processing units which is well suited for further refining to metal.
Jubilee will design, implement and operate the Waste Rock Project. It is expected to cost US$50 million, which will be funded by IRH – which recently acquired Mopani Copper Mines – in accordance with the terms of the partnership. Both the large waste rock dump and the Munkoyo resources align with Jubilee’s strategy of unlocking overlooked copper resources through the application of processing capability. Jubilee says it has identified several further similar opportunities in Zambia which it seeks to secure in the short term as it drives to continuously increase its copper resource base as the catalyst for further expanding its processing capacity.
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