MagAlloy advances Koilu

A memorandum of understanding with Siemens of Germany will enable Magnesium Alloy (YMY-V) to advance the Koilu magnesium project in the Republic of Congo.

The agreement identifies several areas of co-operation, including the supply and delivery of power to the magnesium plant, electrical equipment, technical services and, if required, financing. The parties have already studied the possibility of supplying power from the Inga hydroelectric facility on the Congo River. These studies show that power could be delivered at costs below those assumed in a recent feasibility study.

MagAlloy hopes to begin production at Kouilou by 2005 at the annual rate of 60,000 tonnes of magnesium metal and high-purity magnesium alloys. The company hopes to become one of the world’s largest and lowest-cost producers, using proven dehydration and electrolytic-cell technology to process brine extracted by means of German solution-mining techniques.

The company took on the project in late May 1997. The permits are underlain by the thickest and most complete of the evaporite-salt deposits in the Congo Basin. One of the permits allows for commercial production from the past-producing Holle mine, which produced potash from sylvite sequences.

MagAlloy intends to focus on the production of magnesium and potash from the more uniform and higher magnesium-bearing carnallite and bischofite sequences, using solution-mining technology. Studies estimate that a solution mine well field of about 4-5 sq. km would be sufficient to supply the magnesium plant for 20-25 years. MagAlloy’s 4,800 sq. km are almost entirely underlain by carnallite salt horizons.

From the brine field, a pipeline would transport concentrated brine about 17 km to the processing plant at Pointe-Noire. Total cash costs are estimated at US55 per lb. of magnesium.

Magnesium is used in various industrial applications, including alloys for automotive parts.

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