Miners divided as laterite nickel achieves ascendancy
Laterite nickel production globally has exceeded nickel sulphide-based production for the first time in 2010, Mincor Resources managing director David Moore told the Paydirt 2010 Nickel conference in Perth.
Mr Moore said he did not expect to ever see again another year with more sulphide nickel produced than the generally lower grade, harder-to-mine and process nickel laterite-based volumes.
Mincor’s strategy was to continue to further grow its Kambalda nickel business and discover another ultra-sized nickel sulphide ore body, he said.
Nickel sulphide deposits would be rarer and more valuable.
Meanwhile, European Nickel finance director Mark Hanlon predicted that new nickel laterite heap leaching technology would increasingly provide more competitive and “greener” mining and processing options than in the past.
The proprietary technology – developed in part in a joint venture with BHP Billiton – had achieved three years of successful and substantive testwork.
“It will be the foundation of European Nickel’s new Caldag nickel laterite mine on the west coast of Turkey and our second planned mine, Acoje in the Philippines,” Mr Hanlon said.
The results had encouraged commercialisation of the process as it offered significant lower costs that more conventional laterial HPAL processing methods, he said.
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