
Aukam Graphite Project nears completion

The Aukam processing plant located close to the port city of Luderitz, is in its final phase of construction, with commercial production in its Graphite Project expected to commence soon.
Managed by Canadian outfit, Gratomic, the company appointed concrete expert Fanie Barnard to oversee rebar and baseplate installations and the pouring of concrete foundations at the processing plant, with the concrete work due to finish by end of November.
Gratomic said it was expecting to achieve commercial production later this year or early 2021. It had also announced further drilling in October, to assist in calculating a resource and to support the completion of a preliminary economic assessment for Aukam.
The company said the settling reservoir was being built and all components for the processing plant were now manufactured and assembly would be completed over the upcoming weeks.
“With multiple skilled crews now working on-site, we could not be more proud of the progress being made on our custom-designed processing plant,” Arno Brand, President and CEO of Gratomic, said.
Meanwhile, Gratomic announced that a local company, Pro Edge Steel, in Keetmanshoop is responsible for designing and supplying various structural base plates and steel frames. Pro Edge has delivered the first order of steel structures to the Aukam Processing site and they expect further delivery of the steel frames in short order.