GCA has installed and commissioned three Consep Acacias in Africa, in as many months. The first Acacia found a home at Cata Mine, Tanzania, the second in Liberia and the third was installed in Burkina Faso, with an order for a fourth being placed for Burkina. This brings the total Consep Acacia installations to 24 in Africa, and a staggering 138 worldwide.
The reason for this is simple: Consep Acacias are simply the best at what they do.
Gravity leaching has become a standard method of processing high grade gravity concentrates in gold processing plants. The Acacia offers this in the safest, most cost effective and most efficient way possible. It uses an up flow fluidised reactor for the leaching process, to produce the ideal solid-liquid interaction. This allows maximised gold leaching kinetics without mechanical agitation. As a result, Consep Acacias have no moving parts bar common pumps and valves (thus requiring no guarding), making them substantially safer than competitor products. This is just one of the many safety advantages that Acacia have over competitive technologies, as illustrated below:
| Consep Acacia | Competitor product |
| Minimal moving parts | Rolling drum with pinch points at the rollers and chain |
| No guarding required | Drive parts should be guarded |
| Can be vented for indoors applications | Open to atmosphere at drum discharge |
| Pumps have isolation and rinse points | Positive gas pressure resulting in fume generation |
| Slurry pump doesn’t see cyanide | Open to atmosphere at pump hopper |
| Low energy / static head in the system | Difficult to link to a ventilation system |
| Low solution volumes | Tall solution tank gives high energy / static head |
| Uses LeachAid as the oxidant / catalyst. LeachAid is classed as a low-hazard chemical | Often uses Peroxide – dangerous chemical with a chequered history |
| Short list of maintenance activities | Long list of maintenance activities |
In addition to this, over a decade of product refinement has given the Acacia the advantage of robust and reliable leaching chemistry, superior solids handling techniques, compact design and a simple operating philosophy. All of which allows for the lowest operating costs possible, when compared to other leaching technologies. Furthermore, the compact, packaged plants require minimal client interfacing and therefore greatly reduce installation costs and time.
The Acacia reactor is also able to handle variable concentrate grades, especially very high grades, through maximising the available metallurgical tools. As the design is based around theoretical ideal solid liquid contact data, it allows for easy upscaling – should the need arise. The same cannot be said of other technologies.
Further, LeachAid allows anaerobic dissolution of gold, and thus allows the Consep Acacia to use heated leaching for even faster kinetics and more complete leaching.
In 2011, an independent study conducted in Perth, Australia compared the Consep Acacia to a rival product, operating in a gravity gold circuit. The Acacia replaced the competitor machine, and in addition to drastically increasing gold recovery levels on the plant, it reduced operating costs substantially, thus cutting down the payback period of machinery. Moreover, the Acacia reduced potential safety hazards, significantly reduced the labour required on site, increased security due to no physical contact with gold concentrates, and allowed for better metallurgical accounting.
These are just some of the reasons that GCA is proud to be the official African agent of Consep. Not only is this a privilege in itself, but it allows us to offer our clients access to the best intense cyanide leaching technology in the world, as well as full gravity recovery packages.
Learn more about Consep Acacia reactors on our website, or get in touch to make an enquiry.
