Hwange Colliery to increase production

HWANGE Colliery Company is looking at increasing production from its underground mines after resuming operations a month ago, managing director Thomas Makore said.

“We are working on securing additional underground equipment because we are producing very little,” said Mr Makore without disclosing figures because the company is in closed period.

Hwange, the country’s largest coal miner halted underground mining operations in 2015 after the key equipment provider, Continuous Miner (CM), which accounts for almost half of production, broke down. The CM is a coal extraction machine, which works with auxiliary equipment during production.

At present, Hwange is extracting coal at its open cast pits with much of the output produced by contractor, Mota Engil. Coal produced from the underground pits is largely used for power generation and industrial purposes.

Mr Makore said incessant rains being received in most parts of the country have significantly affected production in the past two weeks as this was affecting the movement of equipment.

“The rains have badly affected our production but we are yet to judge the extent,” he said.

Hwange de-commissioned its coke oven battery, which processes coking coal into coke used in smelters, in 2015 after it became costly to operate. The coking coal, the company is currently producing, is being processed through a toll processing arrangement.

The revival of the battery oven remains under the company’s medium term plans and at least $50 million is needed to replace it. Hwange used to export the high value coke to Zambia and the Democratic Republic of Congo where it was mainly used in copper smelters.