Heavy-haul freight
train schedule. AML has reportedly run trials with 120-wagon trains, and 140-wagon rakes could be introduced in the future, aided by the use of distributed power.
Sierra Leone If ArcelorMittal Liberia’s railway
project was quick to market, African Minerals’ $US 1.2bn refurbishment of the former Marampa mining railway and port in Sierra Leone was completed at light speed, which indicates the pressure miners are under to get their ore to market.
In 2009, London-based African Minerals signed a 99-year lease with the government of Sierra Leone to rehabilitate the 74km 1067mm-gauge railway from the port of Pepel to the old mine at Marampa (now owned by fellow miner London Mining) and build a 126km extension to a new iron-ore mine at Tonkolili. It seemed a tall order: the civil war in Sierra Leone destroyed the country’s transport network and by 2010, according to a Bloomberg News report, the country was ranked third-lowest on the World Bank’s 2010 logistics performance index which measures efficiency and quality of transport networks.
In a bold move, African Minerals
decided to raise capital and begin construction of the mine and new railway even before the final resource estimate was known. It was the right decision - the ore body consists of an estimated 11.6 billion tonnes of magnetite lying under 1.1 billion tonnes of saprolite with 126 million tonnes of direct shipping ore (DSO) lying on top of both. Mining the latter would support the company for about nine years while the other ore bodies are developed.
Of the $US 3bn of debt and equity that the company has raised, $US 1.5bn is from the Shandong Iron & Steel Group in China. In return for its investment, the Chinese steelmaker will receive 10 million tonnes of iron-ore a year at a preferential rate. As the railway’s original rolling stock and locomotives were beyond repair, African Minerals bought new bottom- dump hoppers, and private South African locomotive operator RRL Grindrod is building a second batch of 14 RL30SCC Co-Co diesel-electric locomotives for the railway to complement the 20 that African Minerals has already leased from the company. Tonkolili began production just 14 months after the mining permit was issued and the first ore trains ran in November 2011. As a Bloomberg report
noted in 2012, until the first trains operated, Sierra Leoneans had not seen a functioning locomotive in nearly three decades. With production gradually being ramped up, the railway is expected to be carrying iron-ore at an annual rate of 20 million tonnes by the second quarter of this year. The second phase of the project - which will see annual tonnage eventually increase to 50 million tonnes, and involves construction of a port at Tagrin Point, and a standard-gauge heavy-haul railway from there to Tonkolili - is already underway.
Guinea
The biggest West African rail project of all has yet to see a single sleeper laid. Lying in the Simandou Range in eastern Guinea is what may be the world’s largest iron-ore deposit, which has attracted interest from heavyweights Rio Tinto and Brazil’s Vale. Rio estimates Simandou’s output at 95 million tonnes a year by 2015. To haul the ore, Rio plans to build a 670km standard-gauge railway from the mine west across the country to a port to be built south of the capital Conakry. The project is being developed by Guinean- registered Simfer which is owned 5% by the International Finance Corporation and 95% by a company jointly owned by Rio Tinto and the Aluminium Corporation of China (Chalco). The planned railway is a project of epic scale. While it would be quicker and less costly to build a shorter line south from the Simandou Range to a new or existing port in neighbouring Liberia, the Guinean government has pushed Rio Tinto to build the new east- west railway to boost the country’s development, according to a report from Bloomberg. The proposed railway will be single- track with 13 passing loops. There will be three tunnels, 34 river bridges and nine bridges over roads. The terrain is around 20% dense forest and about 25% open woodland.
In Sierra Leone African Minerals rehabilitated 74km of existing railway and built a 126km extension to Tonkolili.
20
The biggest challenge for the builders will be the 70km crossing of the heavily-forested Mamou Mountains in the centre of the country, a section that will require five river bridges and 78 culverts. Two tunnels of 12km and 11.6km will also be needed. Each tunnel will be fitted with security gates at both ends to prevent pedestrians using them as thoroughfares, a further indication of the unusual environment facing railway operators in Africa. Trains will be 240-wagon consists
IRJ January 2013
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