Zulu lithium plant update
As announced on 24 June 2022, Premier African Minerals accepted a proposal and a quotation to design, supply and deliver to Zulu and to assemble and commission a plant at an additional charge, that was to meet certain specific design and through-put specifications.
The plant was expected to produce Spodumene concentrate at 6% Li20 from March 2023. The plant had not met the specific design and throughput specifications a year after the original target completion date. Material reasons have been set out in previous announcements. Accordingly, Premier has requested that Stark demobilise and leave Zulu immediately and Stark has agreed and done so.
Stark and Premier will continue to engage on the final terms and conditions of any separation and on how best to move forward, however at this time there is a dispute between Stark and Premier pertaining to the Zulu Plant Performance. Premier fully reserves its rights in this regard.
At this time the Zulu plant is being run by the Zulu management team. Premier is now the operator of Zulu.
George Roach, CEO commented, “As is apparent from the points above, this has been a dramatic week, but a necessary one. On the one hand, Premier is obviously disappointed with the further delays, but Premier is pleased with the ability displayed by our engineering team to take on plant operations and demonstrate the skills we have in our team.
Premier is encouraged by the response we have had from OEM suppliers and their commitment to ensure their equipment is optimised to the maximum. As Premier stated on 29 February, we are getting there. Not as quickly as Premier had hoped and with more unnecessary issues than we had anticipated.
Premier does believe this is a major turning point and we look forward providing further updates from Zulu.”