Africa Energy Resources, the exploration outfit has, released Sese Coal project update to investors that showed a reclassification of the resource to an indicated resource and washing tests that suggested the project could produce coal for both export, and domestically.
In an update, the BSE/ Australia quoted company said coal washing test work has been undertaken on coal cores from 85 core holes drilled by African Energy from a total of 174 core holes.
The core samples from these holes were tested at ALS Witlab in South Africa, and the resulting washability data has been analysed to produce yield curves by Gemecs (Pty) Ltd.
The washing tests showed the Lower Main Seam is amenable to either a single?stage or two?stage washing process to produce coal with improved heating values that may be suitable for export.
The Lower Main Seam in Block?B can thus be washed to produce an export quality coal, with an indicative yield of 71.6 percent for a 4,840 kcal/kg single stage product.
Equally, the tests revealed that the Upper Main Seam is characterised by lower yields than the Lower Main Seam at similar RD cut?off points.
“As a low?yield washed product, or as a raw coal blended with the middlings from a two?stage washing of the Lower Main Seam, it is suitable for use as domestic power station fuel,” African Energy added.
“Full Seam raw coal is also suitable as a power station fuel,” it said.
The washability results presented above are representative of 32 core holes tested to date in Block B and show good correlation with earlier test work.
The Sese Coal project comprises one wholly owned prospecting licence (PL96/2005) and six prospecting licence applications located in northeast Botswana, approximately 50km southwest of the town of Francistown.
The project is close to the sealed highway between Francistown and Gaborone and is easily accessible.
The Sese coal resource occurs within Lower Karoo aged sediments and is characterised by a thick (5m to 26m) coal seam that occurs close to the basal unconformity between the Karoo Supergroup and the Precambrian Basement (refer to Diagram 2 as an example of the Block B area).
This thick coal seam is referred to as the Sese Main Seam, and is characterised by a lower seam of coal (SS or Sese Seam) with occasional bright bands and a general lack of silty partings, and by two upper seams of coal (SST or Sese Seam Top and SSU or Sese Seam Upper) separated by a silty parting.
In its latest investor update, which is being presented on a marketing roadshow at the African Mining Conference in Livingstone and at the Indaba Conference in Cape Town, African Energy said Sese project presents Botswana in three dimensions.
The company said in the short term, the project offers early mover participation in emerging market (Botswana coal) while on the medium term the region is exposed to a 300- 600MW greenfield power project based on strong regional electricity demand and low cost coal.
In the long term, the project gives exposure to massive seaborne coal export market when new rail/port becomes operational.
In the update, the company said it was successful in reclassifying of greater than 95 percent of the in?situ resource to the indicated category.
Indiacted resource is the Coal for which estimates of the rank, quality, and quantity have been computed partly from sample analyses and measurements and partly from reasonable geologic projections while in?situ resource refers to the production of useful materials from the resources available at a given location.
To date, a total of 305 drill holes were used in the resource modelling, of which 167 were diamond drill holes and 131 were RC percussion drill holes. All holes were drilled vertically and due to their short nature (16?115 m end of hole depth range) were not deemed to need down?hole surveying.
In all blocks, diamond drilling was undertaken on a 1km x 1km grid allowing a higher core sampling density, and as a result the vast majority of resource has been classified as an Indicated Resource.
Sese Coal project also comes at a time when government is finalising national coal roadmap that will see Botswana monetising its coal resource in a move that will see the country attempting to lessen overreliance on revenues from diamonds.
