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Harmony in Renova Ux, gold swap
David McKay
Posted: Wed, 21 Feb 2007
[miningmx.com] -- RENOVA Group, the Russian mining firm, may build a uranium treatment plant at Harmony Gold’s Randfontein mine west of Johannesburg in exchange for potential gold production in Russia, said Bernard Swanepoel, Harmony Gold CEO.
“That’s all a couple of feasibility studies away, but in a perfect world that’s what could happen,” said Swanepoel in an interview with Miningmx.
“If we could sell our uranium for cash and crystallise value, I think shareholders would be happy with that.”
Swanepoel’s comments follow an announcement from Interfax which said Victor Vekselberg’s Renova Group and Harmony Gold had signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) in Pretoria, South Africa to cooperate “in gold and uranium mining projects”.
Renova could coordinate and invest in joint projects while state nuclear materials exporter, Techsnabexport (Tenex) could also be
involved on Russia’s behalf, according to the MOU.
“This agreement also sits comfortably in the space of the two mines ministers (from South Africa and Russia) cooperating in various ways,” said Swanepoel. An additional factor is that it meets with recent South African government calls for beneficiation of uranium.
In May 2005, sxr Uranium One’s predecessor, Aflease Gold & Uranium (Aflease),
ditched a R200m proposal to buy Harmony’s uranium tailings at Randfontein. The tailings were estimated to contain enough uranium to have doubled Aflease’s then stated resources of about 124 million pounds.
Nigel Suliaman, a fund manager for Metropolitan Asset Managers, said the deal sounded positive. "If this had been Harmony deciding to mine uranium then I'd imagine it was just Bernard pushing ratings," said Suliaman.
"But the fact Harmony is getting someone else to do the uranium is heartening. They're not just chasing the bandwagon," he said.
Swanepoel discounted the possibility of full-blown corporate action between the two companies. “I don’t think Renova would want to be a gold miner and we don’t want to become a diversified mining company either,” he said.
“This is just a plan to cooperate. My team will go to Russia and explore gold mining prospects. We hope to release information on our uranium at the end of the week,” he said.
Bloomberg
News reported that Vekselberg, an adviser to the South African president, had agreed to invest in South African mining projects during a visit
to the country with President Vladimir Putin last year.
Russia aimed to build 42 nuclear power stations at home and 60 in other countries while Harmony wanted more gold outside South Africa due to the rising cost of operating domestic underground mines, Bloomberg News said.
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