VEDANTA Zinc International will start iron ore production from its Northern Cape operation, Black Mountain Mine (BMM) later this year with the aim of establishing an output of three million tons a year.
BMM mines zinc, lead, silver, and copper and has a production capacity of 90,000 tons a year of metal-in-concentrate.
“The Iron Ore project will add another scalable product line to the VZI-BMM (Vedanta-BMM) operations and offer the best-in-class product to our customers,” said Laxman Shekhawat, Vedanta business head.
“The first part of the project will utilise feed from existing operations and produce high-grade iron ore and Dense Media Separation Products (DMS), to be utilised as feedstock for the steel and coal industry respectively,” he added.
The addition of iron ore would also extend the life of mine of operations. Vedanta employs approximately 2,700 people at its Northern Cape facilities.
“We are proud of the impact our current operations have in our communities. We truly believe that the rollout of this new Iron Ore project will allow us the opportunity to create employment opportunities as well as provide ongoing support to our social development projects in the region,” said Shekhawat.
