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By: Jim Harris (Seen in Exploration-Processing, Fall 2010)
With Demand for Limestone on the Rise, Lydford Mining Co. is expanding its Mining Operation into New Investments and Joint Ventures.
One company is finding success and opportunity in the mining
industry from its home in the hills of Jamaica. Lydford Mining
Co. mines hundreds and thousands of tons of limestone and
its derivatives each year from its base in St. Ann, Jamaica, providing
raw materials to clients on and off the island.
“We consider ourselves uniquely positioned in that we have
huge reserves of high quality limestone right where we are,” Managing Director
Edgar Cousins says.
“Our reserves are in the hundreds of millions of tons.”
Materials mined by Lydford have a wide range of uses. Limestone is regularly
used in construction, and processed as ground calcium carbonate is used as filler
for plastics, PVC pipes, fertilizers, animal feeds, paints, industrial cleansers and
scouring powders.
The material is growing in demand for use in food and pharmaceutical applications
including antacids, vitamins and chewing gum, he adds.
“What makes us attractive is we have one of the purest known calcium carbonate
deposits in the world with the lowest known lead values,” Cousins says.
This high purity limestone is leading Lydford Mininginto the coveted food and
drug array of products in the world marketplace.
Processing Capabilities
Lydford processes limestone in a milling operation
it owns in St. Ann. Limestone is either broken
down to 2.5 inches in size or milled down to three
microns in particle size. The larger sizes are
shipped off to customers in the United States,
where it is processed further, while the smaller, finished
limestone is bagged, shrink wrapped, and palletted
for supply to domestic markets in Jamaica as
well as Trinidad and Barbados.
The company is also capable of crushing
and processing other raw materials including
cement using four track-mounted crushing
and screening mobile plants. Lydford is
the only company in Jamaica providing
such a high level of mobile processing,
Cousins says,
“We supply most of the paint companies,
fertilizer companies, soap manufacturers and
PVC pipe makers in Jamaica,” Cousins says.
“We are fully integrated to give us the flexibility
to make our own product primarily for
regional markets; it is our intention, however,
to expand the milling operations we have
and go after markets in other regions.”
The company’s flexibility has helped it
maintain business. “We’re very fortunate in
that, during the recession in the United
States, we’ve held our own in exports,”
Cousins says. “We have seen little decline,
but on the other hand the market also didn’t
grow.” The prospects are that year 2012 will
show significant growth.
In Jamaica, Lydford has seen a demand in
building materials in conjunction with the
construction of a major highway now
underway. Contractor Bouygues Traveux
Construction of France is working on the
project; that company has worked on a
number of major civil projects worldwide,
including the English Channel tunnel.
Joint Ventures
Lydford Mining is expanding operations in
part through joint ventures. Last year, the
company formed a joint venture with Jamaica
Producers Group, a publicly traded agricultural and
food production company in their diversification
program. The venture, Four Rivers Mining Co. Ltd.,
mines and processes igneous-based rock used widely
in construction and paving.
Both companies recently invested a total of $3
million to build a new plant on the north coast of
Jamaica and purchase equipment. Four RiversMining exports outside of Jamaica primarily within
the eastern seaboard of the United States, where a
large market for the igneous material exists, he
adds. “We intend to take advantage of the opportunities
that are there because we have a number
of things going for us here in Jamaica,” Cousins
stresses. “For any mining operation to be a success,
you have to first have a source of raw
material, as well as a deep water port, shipping,
and the markets, and we currently
have those in hand.”
Jamaica Producers Group is a wholly
Jamaican-owned company and the country’s
largest producer of bananas. “The company
was formed with the courageous objective of protecting
the co-operative and the local banana industry
from demise owing to fierce competition from
the large foreign-owned fruit companies in the shipping
and marketing of Jamaican bananas,” the company
says. “It has since grown from strength to
strength, diversifying into shipping and moving up
the value chain to provide processed foods like
smoothies, banana chips and juices.”
Lydford Mining also recently entered a joint venture
with New York-based TBS Shipping to ship
high-purity limestone to Mississippi Lime Co. of St.
Louis for a clean coal burning operation. The limestone
will be mixed and burned along with coal to
remove sulfur dioxide and other contaminants from
coal-burning power plants.
The contract calls for 200,000 tons of limestone
a year, a number that will double in 2012, he adds.
Mississippi Lime is one of the most diversified
producers of lime-based products in North
America, according to the company.
“High-quality products and reliable service have
been the benchmark standard for many of our commodity
customers,” it adds. “Our ability to manipulate
and control both the chemical and physical
properties of limestone allows us to produce specialized
calcium-based products; taking the combination
of discrete particle size, purity and controlled
reactivity provides the customer with a
product tailored to their needs.”
The Lydford/TBS venture also plans to renovate
a seven-mile conveyor line system that was last
used 15 years ago.
The conveyor runs from the company’s mines to a
deep water port in Ocho Rios, Jamaica. The port, capable
of handling ships with capacities of up to 50,000
tons, features an 80,000-ton enclosed storage area and
is designed to load up to 3,000 tons per hour.
“We have a goal to bring this operation up to a
production of 2 [million] to 3 million tons of raw
material a year,” Cousins says.Lydford’s mining experience and reputation help
it find willing business partners.
“We operate at a very high international standard,
this is why a lot of companies have been
attracted to us and that’s why we’ve been able to
engage in these joint ventures,” Cousins says.
Mining Experience
Mechanical and mining engineer Leo Cousins and
geologist and chemist Vincent Hill founded
Lydford Mining in 1991. Hill, a geologist and
chemist, learned of the limestone deposits while
working as a chief chemist for a Jamaican mining
company, while Cousins has experience in the alumina
mining industry, Edgar Cousins says.
The company established mining operations in
an existing bauxite mine, making it easier to conform
to environmental regulations. “We were lucky
in that we have very good people, and that we were
able to set up operations in an area that had a history
of mining, so from an environmental perspective
we were well received,” he adds.
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