Western Areas opens new mine

Western Areas has officially opened its new mine and upgraded plant at Forrestania, south-east of Southern Cross.

In a statement the company said that the opening of the Tim King open pit mine and the stage two expansion of the Cosmic Bay nickel concentrator is a major event in the growth of Western Areas.

The company listed ten years ago as a junior explorer and is now a significant Australian nickel mining company.

In a statement the company said, over the past seven years it has also built a state of the art processing plant, a modern accommodation village for 500 people and substantial infrastructure which will serve this project for many years.

Western Areas said "The opening of the Tim King Pit and upgraded nickel concentrator completes a large part of the infrastructure required to mine and process 25,000 tonnes per annum of nickel. These projects were completed on time, on budget and without a single lost time injury. This work was undertaken and funded before the proposed extra new 40 per cent mining tax was announced."

In its announcement Western Areas also took a swipe at the federal government's proposed resources super profits tax.

"The opportunity to fund and develop new projects like Forrestania will clearly be much harder," the company's statement said.

Western Areas said, "The new extra 40 per cent mining tax will increase the total tax rate to around 57 per cent. As anyone in the resource industry knows, this will make it very difficult for banks to finance new projects and companies to provide reasonable returns to long term shareholders."