The Australian mining and exploration company based in Brisbane, Queensland, Metro Mining, is poised for significant growth as it moves towards increased production from Q4 2024. It has ambitious plans to expand its capacity to over 7 million tonnes per annum by 2025 and beyond.
CEO Simon Wensley attributes the company's recent success to the strategic decision to mobilise and commission the offshore floating terminal (OFT) Ikamba. This key initiative was crucial in achieving record results in the second quarter. Despite its current market capitalisation of $231.64 million, Metro Mining remains steadfast in its commitment to driving organic growth, a strategy that will guide the miner as it navigates the future.
The OFT, Ikamba, commenced operations on April 28, 2024. After an initial commissioning phase running at 50 per cent capacity, Ikamba is now operating at 80 per cent capacity, with peak "free-dig" discharge rates reaching 2,300 tonnes per hour (tph) and average barge rates at 1,700 tph.
“Overall, the progress has been mostly in line with expectations, such as new wobbler in operations, increasing barge loading daily rate, etcetera,” the CEO said.
The project has reached mechanical completion, with the total cost staying within the approved budget of $36.1 million. Metro remains confident in its ability to optimise operations further and increase production volume.
“We believe that with the existing expansion in place and the continuing strength of the traded bauxite market, we are confident with our set target and heading into positive cash flow in the coming years,” Wensley said.
The Metro expansion is perfectly timed as the traded bauxite market continues to grow strongly with Chinese imports up 7.4 per cent year-on-year,” the Australian mining company stated.
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