Nickel Laterite Heap Leaching
Nickel laterite heap leaching was first developed by the National Technical University of Athens (NTUA) primarily by Professor Lina Agatzini-Leonardou in the early 1990's. Various technical publications and presentations were made by the NTUA in the mid to late 1990's and some of the major resource companies commenced investigations into heap leaching, following these publications.
The pace of development has picked up since 2000 with the Yuanjiang heap leach project being constructed and successfully operated by Yunnan Tin Group in China and the well published development of the Çaldag project by European Nickel in Turkey.
Since then there has been a myriad of nickel laterite heap leaching projects at various stages of development, some of these has been published and other developments remain confidential. For the latest update on these projects see the Malachite Consulting Presentation given in Kalgoorlie in September 2007.
Malachite Consulting is now in the position of being able to offer a full development package from concept through to commissioning of a heap leach project. Malachite Consulting would provide the overall project management and typically the major contributors to such a project would include:
- Conceptual, Technical and Financial Evaluation - Malachite Consulting
- Metallurgical Testwork Development - SGS Lakefield Oretest
- Engineering Studies - BatteryLimits
- Heap Design & Dynamic Simulation - Simulus
- Geotechnical Evaluations - Golder Associates
In addition there are a number of companies who would provide the supporting services required for a project of this nature:
- Resource Evaluation
- Mine Planning
- Heap Leach Modelling
- Environmental Studies
- Water Supply and Evaluation
- Supply Logistics
- Materials Handling & Flow Properties
- Legal Services - Intellectual Property
- Risk Assessments
- Independent Auditing
- EPCM Services
- Product Marketing
