The Cawse mine is a mothballed
laterite nickel mine
Mine, mines, miners or mining may refer to:
Extraction or digging
* Miner, a person engaged in mining or digging
*Mining, extraction of mineral resources from the ground through a mine
Grammar
*Mine, a first-person English possessive pronoun
...
near
Ora Banda
Ora Banda is a townsite and locality in the Eastern Goldfields of Western Australia located north-west of Kalgoorlie. The town name is Spanish meaning "band of gold". It includes several operational mines and at the 2016 Australian census ...
in
Western Australia
Western Australia (commonly abbreviated as WA) is a state of Australia occupying the western percent of the land area of Australia excluding external territories. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to th ...
. Cawse has a remnant
Proven Reserve of 3.757 million tonnes of ore grading 0.65%
nickel
Nickel is a chemical element with symbol Ni and atomic number 28. It is a silvery-white lustrous metal with a slight golden tinge. Nickel is a hard and ductile transition metal. Pure nickel is chemically reactive but large pieces are slow to ...
for 24,400 tonnes of nickel, as of 31 December 2009.
The mine, opened in 1999, was Australia's first
high pressure acid leaching operation to mine and treat laterite nickel ore to produce nickel metal on site. It was closed in October 2008, due to depressed metal prices.
Cawse was developed by Centaur Mining & Exploration, with an annual capacity of 9,000 tonnes of nickel and up to 2,000 tonnes of cobalt.
In 2001 it was sold to
OM Group
OM Group Incorporated is a metal-based chemistry firm based in Cleveland, Ohio, United States. It is a provider of speciality chemicals, advanced materials and technologies. The company was listed on the New York Stock Exchange prior to being pri ...
, and subsequently in 2007 was sold to Norilsk Nickel. In 2014 Norilsk Nickel, having placed the mine and plant on care-and-maintenance in 2008, sold it to Wingstar Investments for an undisclosed amount.
References
External links
Cawse Historic Nickel Mine (Central and Extended) Deposit Summary ReportCawse Extended (TNG - Norilsk) Deposit Summary ReportCawseMINEDEX website: CawseDatabase of the
Department of Mines, Industry Regulation and Safety
The Department of Mines, Industry Regulation and Safety is a department of the Government of Western Australia. The department was formed on 1 July 2017, out of the former Department of Mines and Petroleum and Department of Commerce.
A restr ...
Cawse Nickel ProjectEnvironmental Protection Authority of Western Australia
The Environmental Protection Authority of Western Australia (EPA) is a statutory authority within the Government of Western Australia, established on 1 January 1972, which acts as the primary provider of independent environmental advice to the ...
{{Nickel mining in Western Australia
Nickel mines in Western Australia
City of Kalgoorlie–Boulder