Sandvik to outsource jobs

Sandvik plans to sub-contract its service operations to outside businesses in an effort to cut costs.

The areas of the company most likely to be affected include building construction and facilities management, payroll, health care, training and market support. The remaining parts of the company’s service operations will be transferred to other units within Sandvik.

About 180 jobs would be lost at operations in Sweden if Sandvik follows through with the plan.

Canadian-based Hatch has developed what is thought to be the world’s first platinum plant that simultaneously dries and conveys particles.

The system, installed at Anglo Platinum’s Rustenburg smelting complex in South Africa, has a capacity of 96 tonnes per hour and comprises two separate trains. On an hourly basis, each train feeds 48 tonnes of material to the converter-slag and furnace-matte plants.

The trains each consist of two parallel Bateman Pneumo-Driers, a technology predominantly used in the diamond industry, where the driers handle kimberlite ore, alluvial diamond ore, and marine silica sand.

The driers use 4 MW of installed power to reduce the moisture content of platinum matte and slag to 0% from 15%.

Barclays Capital’s new online base and precious metals trading platform is attracting upwards of 100 trades per day.

Jason Tudor, head of metals trading with Barclays, told Reuters that a typical base metals trade comprises 20 lots of metal.

Meanwhile, the London Metal Exchange’s online metals trading platform, dubbed LME Select, has seen average daily trade of 2,939 in the past six months.

Barclays’ online metals market allows clients to trade spot precious metals and three months forward base metals contracts on a continuous, live basis.

Users trade with Barclays at the firm’s proprietary prices.

Moncton, N.B.-based Major Drilling Group will supply Ivanhoe Mines with a UDR 5000 drill, one of the world’s largest, for use at the Turquoise Hill (Oyu Tolgoi) gold and copper discovery in southern Mongolia.

Ivanhoe hopes to use the UDR 5000 to find high-grade core in the Far North discovery zone, which has been delineated to true vertical depths of 2,200 metres. The contract also allows Ivanhoe to pursue the expansion of the identified zones of mineralization at Turquoise Hill, and test other targets on the property.

This is the third phase of the Mongolian operation, and Major has 14 rigs on the property, with drilling slated to continue around the clock for the next 12 months. A new rig will arrive in mid-October, bringing the total to 15.

London-based International Mining Consultants (IMC) has opened an office in Brisbane, Australia.

IMC will initially tackle the regional problem of generating high- resolution images from ground-penetrating radar (GPR) surveys. Jan Francke, from IMC’s Canadian base of operations, will head up the IMC team in Brisbane.

Francke has worked on six continents and is considered a specialist in nickel-laterite operations and GPR surveying.

IMC will also work with local mining companies to find solutions to structural control problems, as well as oxidation in coal mines.

IMC has 30 offices through the globe.