Platinum operations around the South African mining city of Rustenburg will face water use restrictions because of a drought, the Department of Water Affairs said on Friday.
“This is potentially important. Mines are huge users of water in the processing operations and in some cases the mining operations. It’s a very arid part of the world,” said Jonathan Butler, an analyst at Mitsubishi.
The world’s three largest platinum producers, Anglo American Platinum (Amplats), Impala Platinum (Implats) and Lonmin all have operations in the area although Amplats’ mines are not producing at the moment because of a week-long strike.
Producers said they had not yet been significantly affected.
“We have been able to reduce our…water off-take to assist the local municipality without impacting our mining operations to any significant extent,” said Johan Theron, a spokesman for Implats.
North West Province, where Rustenburg is located, last month declared a drought across the whole territory.
“Lonmin has been impacted by current drought conditions and we have plans in place to manage water usage as stringently as possible,” Natascha Viljoen, executive vice president of process and sustainability at Lonmin, told Reuters earlier this week.
South Africa’s platinum belt accounts for about 75 percent of global supplies of the precious metal.
“The Rustenburg local council is about to introduce water restrictions. The platinum mines will be affected though I’m not aware to what extent they will be affected,” department spokesman Themba Khumalo said on Friday.
