Processing
Beneficiation
The processing is divided into two stages the first being Beneficiation that will be carried out under a Build Own Operate Transfer ("BOOT") contract with Mineral Resources Limited. (http://www.mineralresources.com.au/)
The new Beneficiation plant has been designed with excess capacity to ensure that sufficient vanadium bearing magnetite concentrate will be produced so that the roasting kiln can be fully utilised 365 days of the year.
The process flowsheet has been altered to include a high pressure grind rolls and screens instead of a SAG Mill and hydrocylones. This will improve recoveries through elimination of over-grinding that produces slimes that in turn prevent efficient magnetite recovery.
The Beneficiation process at Windimurra involves three stage crushing followed by coarse magnetic separation. The coarse magnetic fraction is then screened at 500um. The oversize is ground and passed through a cyclone before being combined with the screen undersize to undergo further magnetic separation to produce a magnetite concentrate.
Non-magnetic tailings material is screened and coarse tails product will be dry stacked adjacent to the plant while the thickened fine tailings are pumped to the tailings dam.
The beneficiation process is illustrated in Figure 1 below:
Figure 1: Beneficiation Process