Rössing opencast mine

Rössing opencast mine
General information about the mine
The Rössing opencast mine near Swakopmund , Namibia
other names	Rössing uranium mine
Mining technology	Open pit
Overburden	37,755,000 t
Funding / year	8,851,000 t
Information about the mining company
Operating company	Rössing Uranium Limited
Employees	967 (2018)
Start of operation	1976
Funded raw materials
Degradation of	uranium
Mightiness	18 m
Greatest depth	300 m
Geographical location
Coordinates	22 ° 29 '3 "  S , 15 ° 2' 56"  E Coordinates: 22 ° 29 '3 "  S , 15 ° 2' 56"  E
Location Rössing opencast mine
Location	Rossing
local community	Arandis
republic	Republic of Namibia
Country	Namibia

Satellite image (2013). The town of Arandis is on the top left, the open pit mine can be seen on the right

Rössing opencast mine (2009)

The open pit Rossing ( English Rossing uranium mine ) is a uranium - opencast mine in Namibia . The opencast mine in the Klan Mountains not far from the Khan-Rivier supplies around 2.5% of the world's uranium production in 2016 and is considered the largest pure uranium mine in the world.

geology

This deposit is a migmatite zone with uranium- bearing alaskites (granite pegmatites) and metamorphosed bedrock ( gneisses with biotite , cordierite and pyroxene minerals, quartzites , amphibolites , biotite slates and marbles ). The up to 18 m thick pegmatite dikes contain fist-sized mica tablets and a huge orthoclase . The ore with the highest uranium content is Alaskite granite.

The certain and probable reserves of uranium are 100,000–220,000 tons. The average uranium content of the ore is relatively low, it is below 0.045%. The world average is 0.15%.

The Khan Rivier runs through the open pit and leads its water underground to the west to the Atlantic .

There are other Namibian uranium deposits on the Lange Heinrich , the Trekkopje , Aussinanis and Tubas. The uranium deposit at Langen Heinrich has been mined in the Langer Heinrich uranium mine since 2007 . In addition, extensive uranium deposits - it is spoken of by far the largest on earth - have been discovered around the area of ​​today's mining. In December 2016, mining began in the Husab opencast mine (previously also known as Rössing-Süd).

history

The uranium deposit was discovered by chance in 1910 by a German. At that time, a uranium content of 0.02% to 0.04% was measured.

Prospecting did not take place until the 1960s, when Namibia was still called South West Africa and was occupied by South Africa . In 1967 the Khan washed away the prospecting camp, and since 1976 the uranium ore has been mined by " Rössing Uranium Limited ", a subsidiary of the Rio Tinto Zinc mining group until July 2019 . After South Africa did not give Namibia independence after the Second World War , South Africa was banned from exploiting Namibia's mineral resources by UN Resolution No. 1. In addition to Rössing, this also included the copper deposits in Tsumeb and the tin deposit in Uis . That is why the Rössing mine was under strict international supervision and has repeatedly been the target of protests in the western world. After Namibia's independence in 1990, it became known that the operator had not complied with the radiation control system of the International Commission on Radiation Protection ( ICRP).

When the work began, the opencast mine was in the Damara homeland , so Damara was preferred . The settlement of Arandis , 13 km away, was built for the black workers . The higher, mostly white, employees lived in Swakopmund. Arandis is now one of the 20 largest cities in Namibia.

The opencast mine employed over 800 people in 2004, 96% of whom were Namibians. In 2005, 860 permanent employees worked in the opencast mine, another 550 are indirectly employed and provide services.

Parts of this article seem out of date as of 2014 .
Please help to research and insert the missing information .

Originally, the exploitation of the deposit was only supposed to last 20 years, but the end of the mining is only expected in the next few years. Since 2008 geological surveys have been carried out south of the current open pit. The largest uranium deposit on earth, "Rössing-Süd", was discovered here. The start of dismantling was scheduled for 2014. As part of an expansion program, the service life of the mine is to be extended until 2016, for which a further US $ 112 million will be invested. 150 more jobs are to be created as a result.

In mid-July 2019, the China National Uranium Corporation took over the mine.

Dismantling

The ore is in a 300 m deep open pit mined . Extraction is carried out by drilling and blasting , the ore is loaded by rope shovel excavators (Marion 201M, P&H 2100) and a hydraulically driven Demag H485 backhoe in 11 Komatsu 730E tippers with a loading capacity of 180 t each, which transport it to the processing plant.

Technical equipment

All vehicles in the open pit are equipped with a 3.5 m high pennant for better visibility.

The processing plant that enriches the uranium ore into yellow cake , a power station and several pumping stations are located on the 100 km² factory site . The processing residues are clarified in a sedimentation tank , which has a bottom sealed with concrete to prevent contamination of the soil.

Preparation process

The monthly production in 2004 was approx. 1 million tons of ore. The ore is first crushed, ground, then processed using several ion exchange solvent extraction processes and subsequent addition of ammonia to form ammonium diuranate , the yellow cake . It is then dried (dehydrated) and filled into barrels as uranium oxide .

Impact on the environment

As a result of the blasting, a dust fungus that can be seen from afar is created above the opencast mine, which dumps low-level radioactive dust in the area. A lot of water is needed to control dust and to process the rock, around 800,000 m³ / month. That corresponds to the consumption of the state capital Windhoek . The water is obtained by tapping the groundwater supplies of the Riviere Khan, Swakop and Kuiseb .

The abstraction of groundwater has far-reaching effects on native flora and fauna. The Namibian government ignores the Topnaar-Nama protests and does not recognize indigenous leaders as legitimate representatives.

There is no radiation protection law for the dismantling.

Annual productions

year	Processed ore (in 1,000 t)	moved overburden (in 1,000 t)	Ratio of ore to overburden	Extracted uranium oxide U 3 O 8 (in tons)
1999	10,463	15,607	0.67	3,171
2000	11,039	9,787	1.13	3,201
2001	9,084	12,033	0.75	2,643
2002	8,769	13,015	0.67	2,751
2003	8,347	10,434	0.8	2,401
2004	10,972	8,129	1.35	3,582
2005	12,027	7,483	1.61	3.711
2006	12.008	16,835	0.71	3,617
2007	12,613	21,396	0.59	3,046
2008	12,858	33,899	0.38	4,108
2009	12,633	38,755	0.33	4,626
2010	11,598	41,955	0.33	3,628
2011	10,729	39,913	0.27	2.148
2012
2013
2014	7,040		0.43	1,543
2015	6,876		0.55	1,245
2016	9,194		0.56	1,850
2017	9,000		0.63	2.110
2018	8,851		0.77	2,479

Economic situation

As a result of falling world market prices, the open-cast mine slipped into the red in the early and mid-2000s. Since the high of around US $ 86  / kg in 1978, the uranium oxide price has fallen to around $ 14 / kg in the early 2000s. In 2004 it rose again to US $ 42 per kilogram, in 2008 it was around US $ 135 / kg (US $ 61 / lb). Rössing Uranium Ltd. is, however, heavily dependent on currency fluctuations, since the sales proceeds are in US dollars and then have to be converted into Namibian dollars , which are linked to the South African rand . Considerable losses were generated due to the strong devaluation of the US dollar towards the rand. These amounted to over N $ 75 million in 2004 and even to $ 471 million in 2011 due to strikes and the geological situation. Profits are not expected again until 2014. The income of the state of Namibia therefore only results from the income tax payments of the miners, which in 2005 amounted to over N $ 37 million.

Overall, in 2009 and especially in the first half of 2010, the economic importance stabilized and was even able to expand. The share of Namibian GDP should increase from 5.54% to 14.78% by 2015.

2015 was an economically difficult year for the mine. With a turnover of only 1.8 billion Namibian dollars, a loss of 385 million dollars was posted. In 2016 sales rose to three billion Namibian dollars and net profit was 107 million dollars.

sightseeing

The opencast mine can be visited and tours from Swakopmund are organized twice a month by the Swakopmund Museum . Components of the tour are the arrival and departure, a detailed explanation of the processes and finally the tour of the gigantic opencast mine.

See also

• Uranium / tables and graphs

Web links

Commons : Urantagebau Rössing  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Official website (English)
• Swakopmund Museum

Individual evidence

1. ^ History and location of Rössing. Rio Tinto, 2016. Retrieved August 24, 2017.
2. ↑ Rössing Uranium Mine. Mineral Atlas - Fossil Atlas. Retrieved August 24, 2017.
3. ↑ Chamber of Mines Annual Review 2016. The Chamber of Mines of Namibia, May 2017, p. 12
4. ↑ az.com.na ( Memento from November 22, 2011 in the Internet Archive )
5. ↑ ^{a b} Wenda Lund: Rössing and the illegal business with Namibian uranium . Pahl-Rugenstein, 1984, ISBN 3-7609-5169-4 .
6. ↑ Rossing Uranium Mine - Home Page of Namibia's Rossing Mine. In: rossing.com. Retrieved July 1, 2020 . 
7. ↑ Rössing-Süd will surpass everything. ( Memento from November 22, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) In: Allgemeine Zeitung. February 2, 2010.
8. ↑ rossing.com ( Memento from February 22, 2007 in the Internet Archive )
9. ↑ rossing.com
10. ↑ mining-technology.com
11. ↑ Film about the effects of the uranium mines on the Topnaar-Nama ( Memento of the original from September 8, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
12. ^ Charlotte Wiedemann: Uranium mining. In: Die Zeit , No. 15/2011.
13. ↑ riotinto.com ( Memento of October 13, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF)
14. ↑ rossing.com
15. ↑ az.com.na
16. ↑ Ore makes the treasury sound. In: Allgemeine Zeitung. August 23, 2010.
17. ↑ Golden quarter for uranium mining. In: Allgemeine Zeitung. July 22, 2010.
18. ↑ Rössing channels millions into Namibia's economy. Namibia Press Agency, April 25, 2017.