Lucapa Diamond Company Limited and its partner, the Government of the Kingdom of Lesotho (GoL), have announced that the Mothae kimberlite mine expansion project in Lesotho in Southern Africa has been completed. The project is designed to increase nameplate capacity by 45 per cent from approximately 1.1 million tonnes per annum (Mtpa) to 1.6Mtpa.
The processing plant was handed back to the production team after completion of the installation of the new scrubber bypass conveyor, the new primary jaw crusher and other associated upgrades. The project was completed on-time, within budget and with no safety incidents recorded.
Lucapa advised that the upgraded processing plant is being re-commissioned and is being ramped up to its new increased capacity.
It is expected that Mothae will complete this ramp up by the end of the month and will then operate at the new expanded capacity from the beginning of the second quarter of 2021.
Lucapa Managing Director, Stephen Wetherall, said the completion of expansion project on-time and within budget, despite the challenges created by the COVID-19 pandemic earlier in January, is a credit to the Mothae management, staff and contractor teams.
“Lucapa and the GoL look forward to the increased recoveries and economy of scale benefits this expansion was designed to provide,” he said.
Lucapa owns 70 per cent of the high-value Mothae kimberlite mine in partnership with GoL (30 per cent). Mothae is located in Lesotho’s diamond-rich Maluti Mountains.