The first phase of the equipment replacement reached full swing at the Richards Bay Coal Terminal (RBCT) on Thursday when R1.34-billion worth of brand new stacker reclaimers and shiploaders went into official action at greater efficiency and improved turnaround times for coal exporters.
The two new shiploaders are operating at 99% efficiency and the two new stacker reclaimers are taking over from old machines that have been on continuous duty for the past 42 years.
Coal exportation, which has not been interrupted by the machine replacement project, is slightly ahead of what it was at this stage last year, when RBCT exported a record 76.4-million tonnes of coal.
The replacement project was undertaken when the coal price was down at the $70/t and has come on stream at greater efficiency at a coal rice of $110/t.
“The greatest achievement is the safety record. We didn’t injure a soul,” RBCT project GM Bill Murphy said at the launch.
Besides the design, supply and erection of two 6 000 t/h rail-mounted stacker reclaimers and two 10 000 t/h rail-mounted shiploaders, electrical substations have been reconfigured and old machines cut up and sold as scrap.
Increasing the boom lengths of the stacker reclaimers to 60 m reduces the need to bulldoze coal stockpiles and their designcapacity is up from a previous 4 500 t/h.
Structural life expectancy is 40 years plus.
Orders with South African companies amounted to 65% stacker reclaimer local content and a 55% shiploader local content.
Fabrication was done by TZME of China under Sandvik Mining Systems.
Black women own 6.18% of RBCT and a black women engineer had the experience of living in China for six months during the period of fabrication in that country.
The project came in under budget and marginally behind schedule but within the mandate of minimum disruption to the terminal operation.
