22 December 2006
	GVM METALS Listing opens doors By Brendan Ryan

The recent listing of GVM Metals on the JSE adds another coal stock to the bourse and reflects growing opportunities as Eskom looks for additional suppliers and the export market opens up to junior players. There are now five coal stocks on the JSE: GVM, Exxaro Resources, Wescoal, Petmin and Hwange. GVM's coal projects are not new. Two are on coal fields in Limpopo that have been ignored for decades because of their remote location. These are the Limpopo Coal project, 40 km west of Musina, and the Baobab prospect, 50 km south of it. The mineral rights held by Baobab border rights held by Rio Tinto for its Chapudi Coal project, with resources estimated at more than 1bn t. The Limpopo Coal project was first examined in the late 1970s by Utah Mining, which defined a resource of 352 Mt. Utah Mining disinvested from SA in the mid-1980s. GVM is to start its drilling programme in February to validate the Utah work. GVM chairman Richard Linnell says the aim is to develop a mine producing about 5 Mt/year of thermal and metallurgical coal. Linnell says Rio Tinto is in talks with Eskom about supplying a potential new power station from Chapudi. GVM would look to sell thermal coal to the station as well. The Baobab joint venture is aimed at producing coking and metallurgical coal. Linnell says there may be scope for negotiations between GVM and Rio Tinto over rationalisation of some of the holdings in Chapudi and Baobab. GVM's third project is Holfontein, near Witbank. GVM owns 49% of Holfontein, the balance is held by Motjoli Resources. Linnell says the indicated resource is 56 Mt. The mine should produce 800 000 t/ year of thermal coal and 400 000 t of soft coking coal over a projected 20-year mine life.