The Marula Mine is a

platinum Platinum is a chemical element with the symbol Pt and atomic number 78. It is a dense, malleable, ductile, highly unreactive, precious, silverish-white transition metal. Its name originates from Spanish , a diminutive of "silver". Pla ...

mine located in the

Limpopo Limpopo is the northernmost province of South Africa. It is named after the Limpopo River, which forms the province's western and northern borders. The capital and largest city in the province is Polokwane, while the provincial legislature is ...

province of

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the ...

. It is in the eastern limb of the

Bushveld Igneous Complex The Bushveld Igneous Complex (BIC) is the largest layered igneous intrusion within the Earth's crust. It has been tilted and eroded forming the outcrops around what appears to be the edge of a great geological basin: the Transvaal Basin. It i ...

, approximately 35km north-west of Burgersfort. The operation comprises two decline shaft systems which are used to access the UG2 reef. In the 2018 financial year the concentrator plant at Marula mine produced 85 100 oz of platinum, which was processed at

Impala Platinum Impala Platinum Holdings Limited or Implats is a South African holding company that owns several companies which operate mines that produce platinum and platinum group metals, as well as nickel, copper and cobalt. Its most significant mine is the ...

's Mineral Processes in the town

Rustenburg Rustenburg (; , Afrikaans and Dutch: ''City of Rest'') is a city at the foot of the Magaliesberg mountain range. Rustenburg is the most populous city in North West province, South Africa (549,575 in 2011 and 626,522 in the 2016 census). In 20 ...

. Marula mine had an estimated reserve of 10.6 million oz of

in 2018. The labourforce comprised almost 4000 workers in 2018.

History

Platinum was discovered in 1920 by

Hans Merensky Hans Merensky (16 March 1871 – 21 October 1952) was a South African geologist, prospector, scientist, conservationist and philanthropist. He discovered the rich deposit of alluvial diamonds at Alexander Bay in Namaqualand, vast platinum ...

in the area of the current

Modikwa mine The Modikwa platinum mine is a large underground mine in the north-eastern part of South Africa northwest of Burgersfort, Limpopo. It is part of the Bushveld Igneous Complex. Modikwa represents one of the largest platinum reserves in South Africa ...

. In 1988, Impala Platinum acquired the mineral rights to the Winnarshoek farm from the Canadian company, Platexco. They later acquired rights to the farms Clapham and Forest Hill. The establishment of the mine started in October 2002 subsequent to the drilling of 750 exploratory boreholes.

Geology of the mine

The mine holds mining rights to 5 494

hectare The hectare (; SI symbol: ha) is a non-SI metric unit of area equal to a square with 100- metre sides (1 hm2), or 10,000 m2, and is primarily used in the measurement of land. There are 100 hectares in one square kilometre. An acre is ...

s within the Bushveld Igneous Complex, comprising the farms Winnarshoek, Clapham and Forest Hill, as well as a royalty agreement with

which allows it access to additional area. In this region there is a separation of approximately 400m between the

Merensky Reef The Merensky Reef is a layer of igneous rock in the Bushveld Igneous Complex (BIC) in the North West, Limpopo, Gauteng and Mpumalanga provinces of South Africa which together with an underlying layer, the Upper Group 2 Reef (UG2), contains most o ...

and UG2 reef, both of which decline to the west-southwest at 12 to 14 degrees. Potholes and a

dunite Dunite (), also known as olivinite (not to be confused with the mineral olivenite), is an intrusive igneous rock of ultramafic composition and with phaneritic (coarse-grained) texture. The mineral assemblage is greater than 90% olivine, with ...

pipe are present within the area and result in geological losses.

Mining

Both conventional mining methods ("footwall drives below the reef horizon with crosscut breakaways") and hybrid mining methods ("breast mining on the reef from a single gully") are employed at Marula.

Ownership

Marula mine is 73% owned by Impala Platinum with the remaining 27% split equally between three

Black Economic Empowerment Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) is a policy of the South African government which aims to facilitate broader participation in the economy by black people. A form of affirmative action, it is intended especially to redress the inequalities creat ...

partners, namely: * The Marula Community Trust, a local community trust, * Tubatse Platinum, an empowerment consortium of local businesses, and * Mmakau Mining, an established, black-owned mining company.

COVID-19 closure

On 16 May 2020, Impala Platinum announced that it was temporarily shutting Marula mine, owing to a cluster of

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was identified in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. The disease quickly ...

cases in the area. There were 19 positive cases identified in the area. Fourteen of these were Marula mine workers who lived locally and had been tested by the mine after they had returned to the mine once the lockdown regulations in South Africa had allowed them to return to work. They had not started working at the mine yet.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Marula Mine Platinum mines in South Africa Economy of North West (South African province) Economy of Limpopo