Bushveld Vanadium
The Company’s mining and processing assets are located in South Africa, which hosts the largest high-grade primary deposits of vanadium in the world.
The Vametco Mine, Brits Resource and Mokopane Project comprise a total JORC-compliant resource base of at least 548 Mt (100 % basis), including 74 Mt (100 % basis) of JORC-compliant reserves, representing some of the highest primary grades in the world.
Collectively, the Vametco and Vanchem plants provide Bushveld with a flexible and scalable low-cost production platform, enabling it to maintain a competitive position in the vanadium market.
Bushveld Minerals’ large high-grade resource base and processing facilities comprise:
1. Vametco
(Integrated mine and processing facility)
Vametco is a primary low-cost vanadium mining and processing operation, using the salt roast beneficiation process, with a 184.2 Mt JORC-compliant resource, including 46.4 Mt in reserves, with in-magnetite vanadium grades averaging 2.0% V2O5 and a life of mine of more than 30 years (details can be found in the Minerals Resource and Reserves section of this Annual Report).
The Vametco mine is an opencast mine along a strike of approximately 3.5 km. Vametco produces a steel-alloying vanadium carbon nitride product, called Nitrovan.
2. Brits Resource
Brits includes prospecting rights and a mining right under application on farms adjacent to Vametco. The mineralisation is outcropping and a continuation of the Vametco deposit. A Competent Person’s Report (“CPR”) was published in January 2020, showed an aggregate Inferred and Indicated Mineral Resource distributed across the three seams (the Lower, Intermediate, and Upper Seams) of 66.8 Mt at an average grade of 1.6% V2O5 in-magnetite, which is among the highest grades in the world.
Brits has the potential to supply additional feed tonnage for the Vametco plant, and if required, concentrate feed for Vanchem.
3. Vanchem (Processing facility)
Vanchem is a primary vanadium-processing facility with a beneficiation plant. It is located at Ferrobank Industrial Park in Emalahleni Local Municipality, Mpumalanga Province, in South Africa. It produces vanadium pentoxide, ferrovanadium and vanadium chemicals and is capable of producing vanadium trioxide. Vanchem uses the salt-roast beneficiation process, similar to that used at Vametco.
4. Mokopane (Project)
Mokopane is located on the central portion of the northern limb of the Bushveld Complex. The project is in the Mokopane District of Limpopo Province, approximately 65 kilometres west of the provincial capital, Polokwane. The project includes one of the world’s largest primary vanadium resources, with a weighted average grade of 1.4% V2O5 in-whole rock and 1.75% V2O5 in-magnetite.
