Morupule Coal Mine Awards Opencast Contract

Morupule Coal Mine (MCM) has awarded a five-year mining services contract towards the development of an opencast coal mining operation at its Motheo project.

The contract will be executed by a joint venture (JV) between Bothakga Burrow (BB), a local citizen owned company and Basil

Read Mining (BR), a South African based company. MCM’s chief public and corporate affairs officer, Boineelo Seitshiro said the JV will be responsible for the development of an opencast coal mine aligned with Morupule’s resource development plan.

The team will commence with site establishment and mobilisation in April 2021.

“Construction of the opencast operation will be aligned to the construction and commissioning of the coal wash plant commonly referred to as the CHPP (Coal Handling and Preparation Plant),” Seitshiro said.

“The CHPP is currently at structural construction stage with envisaged commissioning handover and first coaling by December 2021,” she added.

Motheo is an expansion project established by MCM to develop an opencast mine, a coal washing plant and associated infrastructure.

The ultimate aim of the project is to facilitate MCM’s contribution to Botswana’s economic growth and transformation of coal into unlimited sources of energy.

The project is envisaged to increase coal production capacity from the current 2.8 million tons to 3.8 million tons per annum.

The BR-BB JV contract award represents MCM’s commitment to the promotion of Citizen Economic Empowerment and making available more impactful opportunities to local procurement and local employment in Botswana.

“MCM is at the heart of a prosperous future for the nation.

We have made it our mission to mine the coal that powers the nation for the benefit of all our stakeholders,” stated MCM.

The colliery has a mining lease area covering approximately 42 531.625ha and a total inventory coal of 4 285Mt both from indicated, inferred and measured resource categories: MCM 1, MCM 2, MCM 3 North and MCM 3 South.

MCM is currently operating an underground mine at its MCM1 resource.

Motheo project will mine the MCM 3 resource block. The MCM 3 resource block alone has potential to supply power station grade coal for over 30 years.

The BR-BB (JV) mining contract was signed off in April 2021.