The Jwaneng

diamond mine There are a limited number of commercially available diamond mines currently operating in the world, with the 50 largest mines accounting for approximately 90% of global supply. Diamonds are also mined alluvially over disperse areas, where dia ...

is the richest

diamond Diamond is a Allotropes of carbon, solid form of the element carbon with its atoms arranged in a crystal structure called diamond cubic. Another solid form of carbon known as graphite is the Chemical stability, chemically stable form of car ...

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 ...

in the world and is located in south-central

Botswana Botswana (, ), officially the Republic of Botswana ( tn, Lefatshe la Botswana, label=Setswana, ), is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. Botswana is topographically flat, with approximately 70 percent of its territory being the Kalahar ...

about west of the city of

Gaborone Gaborone ( , , ) is the capital and largest city of Botswana with a population of 246,325 based on the 2022 census, about 10% of the total population of Botswana. Its agglomeration is home to 421,907 inhabitants at the 2011 census. Gaboron ...

, in the Naledi river valley of the

Kalahari The Kalahari Desert is a large semi-arid sandy savanna in Southern Africa extending for , covering much of Botswana, and parts of Namibia and South Africa. It is not to be confused with the Angolan, Namibian, and South African Namib coastal de ...

. Jwaneng, meaning "a place of small stones", is owned by

Debswana Debswana Diamond Company Limited, or simply Debswana, is a mining company located in Botswana, and is the world's leading producer of diamonds by value. Debswana operates four diamond mines in the eastern and central parts of Botswana, as well a ...

, a

partnership A partnership is an arrangement where parties, known as business partners, agree to cooperate to advance their mutual interests. The partners in a partnership may be individuals, businesses, interest-based organizations, schools, governments o ...

between the

De Beers De Beers Group is an international corporation that specializes in diamond mining, diamond exploitation, diamond retail, diamond trading and industrial diamond manufacturing sectors. The company is active in open-pit, large-scale alluvial and c ...

company and the government of Botswana. It is the second newest of four mines operated by the company, having begun operations in 1982. Jwaneng is an

open pit Open-pit mining, also known as open-cast or open-cut mining and in larger contexts mega-mining, is a surface mining technique of extracting rock or minerals from the earth from an open-air pit, sometimes known as a borrow. This form of minin ...

mine. The mine produces 9.3 million tons per year of

ore Ore is natural rock or sediment that contains one or more valuable minerals, typically containing metals, that can be mined, treated and sold at a profit.Encyclopædia Britannica. "Ore". Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Retrieved 7 Apr ...

and an additional 37 million tons per year of waste rock. The mine is located on three

kimberlite Kimberlite is an igneous rock and a rare variant of peridotite. It is most commonly known to be the main host matrix for diamonds. It is named after the town of Kimberley in South Africa, where the discovery of an diamond called the Star of ...

pipes Pipe(s), PIPE(S) or piping may refer to: Objects * Pipe (fluid conveyance), a hollow cylinder following certain dimension rules ** Piping, the use of pipes in industry * Smoking pipe ** Tobacco pipe * Half-pipe and quarter pipe, semi-circula ...

that converge near the surface, covering 520,000 square metres at ground level. Currently, the mine produces approximately 11 million carats (2,200 kg) of diamonds. The recoverable

ore grade Ore is natural Rock (geology), rock or sediment that contains one or more valuable minerals, typically containing metals, that can be mined, treated and sold at a profit.Encyclopædia Britannica. "Ore". Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Ret ...

at the mine is about 1.25 carats per ton (250 mg/t). , known reserves will allow production at current levels to continue for 27 years. The high rate of diamond extraction, combined with high quality diamonds fetching excellent per weight prices, make the Jwaneng diamond mine the richest diamond mine in the world by value of recovered diamonds. Jwaneng employs over 2,100 people. The mine also owns and operates a local

hospital A hospital is a health care institution providing patient treatment with specialized health science and auxiliary healthcare staff and medical equipment. The best-known type of hospital is the general hospital, which typically has an emerge ...

and

Jwaneng Airport Jwaneng Airport is an airport serving Jwaneng, a town in the Southern District of Botswana. It is owned by Debswana, which also owns the Jwaneng diamond mine. There is no scheduled airline service. The Jwaneng non-directional beacon (Ident: JW ...

. The mine maintains an ISO 14001 certificate for environmental compliance, being the first mine in Botswana to achieve this certification in 2000. Jwaneng is known for its excellent safety record, winning multiple national and international safety awards.Debswana Jwanneng operations
The Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus (ETM+) instrument on NASA’s

Landsat 7 Landsat 7 is the seventh satellite of the Landsat program. Launched on 15 April 1999, Landsat 7's primary goal is to refresh the global archive of satellite photos, providing up-to-date and cloud-free images. The Landsat program is managed and ...

satellite acquired this image of the Jwaneng Diamond Mine on May 17, 2001. The arid, flat landscape that fills most of this image appears in varying shades of brown, crisscrossed by pale beige roads. The Jwaneng Diamond Mine appears in the upper left quadrant of the picture, and a residential area appears near the bottom center. At the center of the diamond mine, a series of concentric circles cut deeper and deeper into the ground. Surrounding the pit is a network of roads and structures related to the mining operation. The settlement southeast of the mine contrasts with the arid landscape as much as the mine does. Here, tiny dots of green hint at trees and grassy parks. The pale beige rectangles around the perimeter of this image are probably crops or fallow fields. New Images: Jwaneng Diamond Mine, Botswana
This article incorporates

public domain The public domain (PD) consists of all the creative work A creative work is a manifestation of creative effort including fine artwork (sculpture, paintings, drawing, sketching, performance art), dance, writing (literature), filmmaking, ...

text from this

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil space program, aeronautics research, and space research. NASA was established in 1958, succeeding t ...

webpage. The Jwaneng mining lease includes the Jwana Game Park, which includes a field unit of Cheetah Conservation Botswana. The game park is also host to the globally threatened

lappet-faced vulture The lappet-faced vulture or Nubian vulture (''Torgos tracheliotos'') is an Old World vulture belonging to the bird order Accipitriformes, which also includes eagles, kites, buzzards and hawks. It is the only member of the genus ''Torgos''. It ...

References

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Debswana Jwanneng operations
Primary source for article. (Accessed 1/28/11) Diamond mines in Botswana Diatremes of Botswana Open-pit mines Pre-Holocene volcanoes Surface mines in Botswana