[www.ferro-alloys.com]The firm running Plymouth's £130million tungsten mine has benefited from a hike in ore prices but still has financial pressures and has had to tackle noise problems caused to neighbouring residents.

Specialty metals producer Wolf Minerals Limited has installed external steel columns around the processing plant at Drakelands mine, in Hemerdon, to reduce the generation of low frequency noise.

In a new progress report, the company said initial results of putting up the steelwork had showed "a much reduced level of low frequency noise" coming from the plant and a reduction in "the quantity of noise in the surrounding areas".

"Further work to reduce noise from the processing plant is ongoing to minimise the impact on the community," the report said.

The firm is also measuring ground vibrations caused by the regular blasting in the open-caste pit.

Wolf said results are "below prescribed levels" but admitted nearby residents had expressed concerns about blasting.

It has held public information sessions and said it is working with an independent expert and local authorities on "best practice blast design" to minimise impacts felt by residents.

The firm stressed it had helped build a new church hall (below), bought a storage container for a football club, funded installation of emergency defibrillators for two villages and established community trusts to support projects with Sparkwell, Shaugh Prior and Cornwood parish councils.

"Wolf believes long-term success hinges on sustainable development that benefits the business, stakeholders and the environment," the report said.

Meanwhile, Wolf has benefited from increased tungsten ore prices, but problems with the processing plant at the tungsten and tin mine mean it has failed to supply on key contracts and may face a financial penalty.

And it has also had to apply to draw down an additional £9million from its safety-blanket finance facility.

Nevertheless, the company said, in a progress update report, that "good progress" was being made at the open-caste pit, with more than 1.6million tonnes of ore dug out to date.

In May, the firm's Quarterly Activities Report revealed the firm had signed a deal to secure a £25million safety-blanket finance facility.

This came after doubts were raised about the mine's viability by auditor PFK Mack when Wolf reported a loss after tax of A$24,250,452 in the last six months of 2015.

The finance facility was needed because tungsten prices had been hit by the general fall in commodity prices, halving since the Drakelands project started construction in March 2014 and still being below that level.

But the new progress report said the price had risen to US$225/mtu from March 2016's quarter average of US$172/mtu, before settling at US$200/mtu.

However, the company has still had to request the remaining £9million from its standby share subscription facility, after taking £16million in April.

"The price improvement is a positive indication for the market outlook, however the APT (ammonium paratungstate – the key intermediary product in the tungsten supply chain) price remains some US$160/mtu lower than when construction of Drakelands commenced in March 2014," the report said.

"The weak tungsten price contributed to the company's decision to strengthen its balance sheet through a £25million standby subscription facility.

"The company made an initial subscription request for £16million under the facility in late April 2016.

"Having considered the challenges encountered during the processing plant ramp up and continued softness in the tungsten price, a further subscription request has been made for the remaining £9million available.

"Subscribing for the balance of the facility enables the company to direct maximum efforts to improving the performance of the processing plant and optimisation of ore feed."

Also, the processing plant – developed by Wolf through a contract with GR Engineering Services Limited (GRES) – has had problems, with hampered by "core equipment manufacturing faults" leading to high levels of unplanned downtime.

In June 2016, the processing plant was tested by Wolf and GRES and a number of areas where "further improvement and defect correction is required" were discovered.

Work has started to address these but the report said: "The production of tungsten concentrate has been adversely affected by the underperformance of the processing plant.

"As a result Wolf has not met its contracted supply commitments to major customers.

"In these circumstances, the contract term is automatically extended until the product shortfall is supplied and a price penalty is activated.

• [Editor:Jiang Li Juan ]