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Global diversified miner BHP produced nearly two-million tonnes of copper and record iron-ore production for the financial year ended June 30, but has substantially lowered its copper production guidance for the 2027 financial year, mainly as a result of a decline in grades at the Escondida mine, in Chile.

The company's copper mines produced 1.95-million tonnes in the 2026 financial year, in line with guidance of 1.9-million to two-million tonnes. Iron-ore output, meanwhile, increased by 1% year-on-year to a record 265-million tonnes, in line with guidance of 258-million to 269-million tonnes.

"We finished the year strongly, delivering safe and reliable operations while setting several performance records across the business.

"For the second consecutive year, we produced around two-million tonnes of copper and delivered record iron-ore production, demonstrating the power of a disciplined operating system and world-class assets.

"We achieved this against a backdrop of stronger realised prices for both copper and iron-ore, with copper prices around 35% higher than a year ago. Cost control was particularly strong, with every asset expected to be within unit cost guidance despite headwinds from inflation, higher diesel prices and global supply chain disruptions," says CEO Brandon Craig.

He adds that the group is also continuing to build the next phase of growth. During the year under review, it progressed applications to restart Cerro Colorado, in Chile, defined development pathways for Copper South Australia, Escondida and Spence, and expanded its future copper options in the US through progress at Resolution and its investment in Faraday, while Vicuña, in Argentina, received Incentive Regime for Large Investments approval.

"In Canada, Jansen is on track to begin potash production next year, adding a new commodity and further diversifying our portfolio.

"We enter the new year with momentum and significant opportunities to accelerate improvements in safety, productivity and reliability through our operating system and the adoption of technology," Craig comments.

COPPER BHP has set its copper guidance for the 2027 financial year at between 1.65-million and 1.8-million tonnes – a year-on-year decrease of about 15%.

For the year ended June 30, the Escondida mine produced 1.26-million tonnes of copper, a 3% year-on-year decline as a result of a planned lower concentrator feed grade of 0.90%, compared with 1.02% the year before.

Concentrator feed grade for the 2027 financial year is expected to be about 0.70% and Escondida is expected to produce between one-million and 1.1-million tonnes of copper for the financial year.

Meanwhile, BHP's Pampa Norte operations, which include the Spence and Cerro Colorado mines, produced 213 000 t of copper for the 2026 financial year – a 21% year-on-year decrease.

Output at the Spence mine decreased as a result of ongoing challenges with processing complex ore at the concentrator and the planned decline in stacked feed grade at the cathode plant.

The Spence Concentrator Upgrade Recovery project, which upgrades the flotation circuit to increase residence time and improve recoveries, was sanctioned in June, with first production expected during the 2028 financial year.

"Once commissioned, we expect the project will allow us to more effectively manage Spence's ore complexity and variability," BHP reports.

The group in June also sanctioned the Spence Chalcopyrite Leaching project, which will include the implementation of BHP's sulphide leaching technology, Simple Approach to Leaching 2, to enable processing of hypogene ores and to use latent capacity in the cathode infrastructure. First production expected in the 2028 calendar year.

Spence is expected to produce between 21...

This audio is brought to you by Endress and Hauser, a global leader in process and laboratory measurement technology, offering a broad portfolio of instruments, solutions and services for industrial process measurement and automation.

The new elusion circuit and smelt house facility at DRDGOLD's Far West Gold Recoveries is performing to specification.

"The initial capital estimate was met, and we came in on time and within budget," DRDGOLD CEO Niël Pretorius reported during a webinar in which DRDGOLD CFO Henriette Hooijer and DRDGOLD COO Jaco Schoeman also participated to provide an update on the progress of Vision 2028, DRDGOLD's five-project programme involving a capital expenditure of R10-billion. (Also watch attached Creamer Media video.)

The new facility was commissioned on Tuesday, July 14, when the first doré gold bar was poured.

A doré bar is a semi-pure, unrefined alloy of gold produced directly at a mine site.

Once fully ramped up, the new facility will increase monthly plant throughput to 1.2-million tons a month and contribute 16 years of mine life at that rate.

Over the next few weeks – and in the months to follow before the rest of the Far West Gold Recoveries infrastructure is commissioned – the plan is to commence material processing and treating material at the new carbon-in-leach circuit, while concurrently conducting a full service of the existing circuit that has been in operation since 2018.

Up to now, Far West Gold Recoveries personnel have had to send away their output without ever seeing its conversion to gold.

But all that changed this week when a beaming plant manager held aloft gold what weighed just over 17 kg – and the appreciative workforce witnessed end product being produced before their eyes.

"It was a good event for us," an upbeat Pretorius remarked during the webinar covered by Mining Weekly.

After the smelt, the gold bar was whisked away by helicopter, roughly four minutes after the above picture was taken, which is the nature of the gold transportation logistics being deployed.

The helipad next to the smelt house is also fully walled, which means that security, logistics and the flow of material played a big part in the facility's design and construction.

Four years ago, DRDGOLD, as part of its ongoing commitment to optimising its portfolio of assets, initiated a capital investment programme aimed at structurally reconfiguring the cost provide of the cost profile of Ergo, the gold-from-waste operation on Gauteng's East Rand, and developing the infrastructure required to extend its life of mine, while increasing both throughput and production capacity.

It was a two-part programme, the first involving the construction of a 60 MW solar plant and a 187 MWh battery energy storage system (BESS) at Ergo.

Construction started in financial year (FY) 2022 and the project was commissioned in FY 2025.

This investment has fundamentally reset Ergo's cost profile, strengthening energy security, reducing its carbon footprint, and demonstrating how investment in strategic infrastructure can improve both operational resilience and financial performance.

Currently, the solar and BESS plant supplies around 47% of Ergo's electricity requirements for around 12 hours a day.

The second part, the R10-billion capital infrastructure investment programme involving the five projects, was aimed at establishing tailings storage and plant throughput capacity capable of lifting combined throughput from the company's two operations, Ergo and Far West Gold Recoveries from around 2.15-million tonnes a month to three-million tonnes a month and grow annual gold production to six tonnes by 2028, the programme dubbed Vision 2028, on which construction started in FY 2024.

Now, that vision is being realised with its first major milestone being the resumption of deposition on to the Daggafontein tailings storage facility (TSF).

On June 25, water was first pumped to the facility and the first deposition of tailings followed on Jul...

This audio is brought to you by Endress and Hauser, a global leader in process and laboratory measurement technology, offering a broad portfolio of instruments, solutions and services for industrial process measurement and automation.

South Africa's national mineral research organisation Mintek is targeting global recognition as a minerals flotation researcher, the State-owned organisation emphasised at its recent platinum group metals (PGM) event.

Mintek's flotation group is viewed as being well positioned to expand its impact through several strategic opportunities, which range from sustainable mining to industrial support and the circular economy.

"We're aiming to become a globally recognised centre of excellence in flotation research through technology partnership and industrial implementation," Mintek post-doctoral research fellow Dr Mandla Chabalala declared at the PGM Industry Day. (Also watch attached Creamer Media video.)

Mintek makes no bones about its aspiration to become a world-class scientific research organisation with practical industrial solutions that support safer, more efficient and environmentally sustainable minerals processing.

In partnership with various stakeholders, it is looking into expanding its global footprint as well as its standing as a global minerals and metallurgical innovation leader.

Chabalala, who was one of one of a dozen Mintek managers, engineers and scientists who presented in the auditorium of this 92-year-old State-owned research organisation situated at 200 Malibongwe Drive in Randburg, said: "I'm available for technical discussions around how we can work together and become of service to you."

His group falls under Mintek's minerals processing division: "We're a team of about 14 to 15, but given the work we do, you'd think we numbered about 100.

"We see ourselves as laboratory pilot and plant scale flotation experts. We specialise in process development and optimisation, and we strive to excel in technology implementation and troubleshooting.

"Our core capabilities lie in the space of process development and scale up, where we start from the bottom and see you all the way up to your processing in the plant.

"We also look at reagent synthesis and engineering, where we can develop new reagents or look at what's currently being used and then modify it, depending on what you're looking for in the ore type that we're treating," Chabalala outlined during his end-to-end flotation solution presentation that extended beyond PGMs into the likes of copper flotation and rare earth elements.

Pursuits include:

circuit development and optimisation to maximise efficiency and improve strategies;plant support, industrial applications and coming on site to do audits, identify problems, and propose solutions; anddata modelling and digital analysis, a recent assignment proving to be "quite useful".

What can one expect when engaging Mintek on flotation?

Outlined was baseline laboratory test work informing process design as well as implementation around concentrate grade optimisation.

"We don't just do lab work and leave it there. We go all the way up to saying let's upscale and see what we can get and what we need to adjust to maximise efficiency and recoveries when we go to the plant," Chabalala explained during the presentation covered by Mining Weekly.

Current projects go beyond PGMs into copper flotation and even the effect of microorganisms, living things so small that they can only be seen with a microscope.

"We know that microbes can be used for beneficiation and we want to see how we can use microbes to assist our flotation efficiencies and then also to look into contaminated PGMs such as spillages, or other contaminants in the plant."

Treating tailings and mine waste, rare earth elements, and the circular economy are on the wanted list of Mintek, which goes beyond working with the mining industry alone.

"We have a wide range of partners, which include universities and research institutions,...

This audio is brought to you by Endress and Hauser, a global leader in process and laboratory measurement technology, offering a broad portfolio of instruments, solutions and services for industrial process measurement and automation.

Northern Minerals said on Tuesday that Australian Treasurer Jim Chalmers has ordered three offshore investment firms, including Hong Kong Ying Tak, to refrain from exercising their voting rights in the rare earths developer.

Australia's Foreign Investment Review Board (FIRB) said Hong Kong Ying Tak, British Virgin Islands-registered Real International Resources, and Hong Kong-registered Qogir Trading & Service failed to comply with earlier government orders to reduce their stakes in Northern Minerals.

In May, Treasurer Chalmers ordered six offshore shareholders to divest their holdings by July 2 over concerns that Chinese-linked parties were seeking control of the rare earths miner.

Reuters was unable to contact Ying Tak, which has no phone number or email listed on Hong Kong's companies registry, for comment.

"Northern Minerals welcomes the Federal Treasurer's interim directions regarding compliance with his May Disposal Orders," Northern Minerals chairperson Adam Handley said on Tuesday.

Handley said a review of Northern Minerals' share register on July 10 found that most of the shares covered by the May divestment orders were still held by the investors targeted by those orders.

This audio is brought to you by Endress and Hauser, a global leader in process and laboratory measurement technology, offering a broad portfolio of instruments, solutions and services for industrial process measurement and automation.

Remaining project capital of R964-milion of the total of R4.4-billion in real 2026 terms is to be spent this year and next on Sibanye-Stillwater's K4 platinum group metals (PGMs) project at Marikana in South Africa's North West Province.

The project is on track for steady state production in 2033 and has a 48-year economic life, which bodes well for the community of the Rustenburg municipal area in particular. (Also watch attached Creamer Media video.)

Ramp-up of production at K4 began in the second quarter of 2022 and the operation is expected to employ 4 380 people when it reaches steady state.

Already 77% complete, K4 has a net present value of R17.6-billion and is described as "a high-return project" underpinned by extensive existing infrastructure.

Monthly rock break is projected to be at a rate of 39 000 m2/m and monthly reef hoisting 190 000 t/m, which equates at steady state to 21 000 four element (4E) ounces a month and 250 000 oz a year.

The reef mix of 55% Merensky and 45% upper group two is described as being key for the smelting strategy within Sibanye-Stillwater's PGM segment.

This was spelt out by Sibanye-Stillwater EVP mining operations Dawie van Aswegen, in his overview of the Johannesburg stock Exchange-listed company's South Africa PGM operations, which stretches from the town of Brits to the town of Rustenburg, in the lower section of the western limb of the PGM-rich Igneous Bushveld Complex.

Sibanye-Stillwater commenced its PGM business in mid-2016, when it acquired Aquarius Platinum.

Later that same year, it acquired the Rustenburg platinum mines from the then Anglo American Platinum, which is now Valterra Platinum.

K4 was acquired from Lonmin in 2019 and that acquisition marked the conclusion of Sibanye-Stillwater's South Africa PGM acquisition strategy.

"The orebody is homogeneous, so what that means is that it stretches all 70 km from east to west, and it's got a constant of dip of nine degrees from south to north," Van Aswegen explained during his presentation covered by Mining Weekly.

Sibanye-Stillwater's underground PGM business consists of six trackless mechanised operations and eight conventional operations, with 44 000 people employed it total, own employees as well as contractor employees.

From inception, the PGM operations have met annual guidance.

Owing to a closure at Marikana and a shaft reaching end of its life at Kroondal, slight production reductions have been recorded but "this was partly countered by the gradual buildup of our K4 operations at our Marikana operations", Van Aswegen pointed out.

Optimisation, restructuring, and a simple operating model resulted in a right-sized PGM segment, added Van Aswegen, who described operating cost per 6E ounce as being comparable to "the lowest of our peers".

Increased stay-in-business (SIB) capital spend per 6E ounce is also said to rank below two of peers.

On average, for the last couple of years, in the region of R4.5-billion had been spent on ore reserve development (ORD) and SIB capital requirements, with continuous ORD being under way at conventional shafts and SIB per 6E ounce comparing well with peers since 2023.

However, a primary mining profile in steady decline – excluding projects – was displayed on the screen.

"If we look at our primary mining outlook, there's a drop in profile but also very important to note is that this excludes our East 4, Siphumelele and Thembelani projects," Van Aswegan pointed out.

But despite the declining profile, the cost forecast would remain competitive, with all-in sustaining costs benefiting from by-product credits that include chrome.

In general, the SIB capital spending involves 9% of total operating cost for trackless mobile machinery operations, and 7% for conventional...