11 / 76
August 2016
MODERN MINING
9
MINING News
Resource base at Blanket increased and upgraded
Caledonia Mining Corporation, listed on the
TSX and AIM, has announced an increase
and upgrade to the resource base at its
49 %-owned subsidiary, the Blanket gold
mine in Zimbabwe.
Based on the diamond core drilling that
has been done at depth below the Blanket
section over the past half year, 343 000
tonnes have been upgraded from the
inferred to the indicated resource category
and an additional 1,28 Mt of new inventory
has been added to inferred resources.
This upgraded indicated resource
of 343 000 tonnes, combined with the
resources upgraded during 2015, have
increased the quantum of reserves and
indicated resources that may be used in the
life of mine plan from the 2,93 Mt used for
the Technical Report prepared by Minxcon
in December 2014 to 4,89 Mt currently. This
represents an increase of 67 % in terms of
mineable tonnes and hence in the life of the
mine.
Commenting on the resource upgrade,
Steve Curtis, Caledonia’s President and CEO,
said: “This upgrade reflects the ongoing
focus on resource development at Blanket
mine. It should be noted that the upgrades
are only in the Blanket section of the mine
and that further resource upgrades in the
AR South, AR Main and Eroica sections will
be released in the second half of the year.
Cat 6030 300T shovel and 10 Cat 777s, all
new machines, were delivered during the
quarter. In Q3 an additional 10 new 777s
and three new drill rigs are expected,
which – says Asanko – will go a long way
towards improving net asset utilisation,
increasing efficiencies and lowering costs.
The processing plant processed 702 318
tonnes of ore at an average grade of
1,69 g/t gold during the quarter. Recovery
of gold was in line with expectations with
higher recoveries achieved in the latter half
of the quarter once the oxygen plant was
fully operational. The average gold recov-
ery for the quarter was 92 %.
During the quarter a number of opera-
tional improvements were implemented
in the processing plant including mechan-
ical changes to the materials handling and
crushing circuits, ball mill and SAG mill
gear changes and other de-bottlenecking
work that resulted in higher than normal
planned mechanical downtime in the pro-
cessing plant. The goal of the work was
to optimise the inherent additional mill
capacity and operate at 275 000 tonnes
per month, or about 10 % above design
rates on a continuous basis. With the bulk
of the changes completed by early June,
the processing plant treated 265 000 t
during the month and is now operat-
ing at the levels anticipated from these
improvements.
Commenting on the quarter’s results,
Peter Breese, Asanko’s President and CEO,
said: “The Asanko Gold Mine delivered a
strong quarter; commercial production
was achieved a quarter ahead of sched-
ule, gold production of 36 337 ounces
was in-line with our guidance and ramp-
up to steady-state production levels was
reached within six months of starting the
new production plant.”
Updating on the status of its Sissingué
gold project in Côte d’Ivoire in its latest
quarterly report (for the period ending
30 June), Australia’s Perseus Mining says
that post the end of the quarter and fol-
lowing the successful raising of equity
finance, execution plans for the full-scale
development of Sissingué were activated.
At a total development cost to com-
pletion of US$100 million, Sissingué is
currently forecast to produce 385 000
ounces of gold at an all-in site cost of
US$632/ounce over a 5,25-year period
from first gold production to generate an
ungeared after-tax IRR of 27 % at an aver-
age gold price of US$1 200/ounce.
Perseus says negotiations with a
highly regarded Australian contrac-
tor (Lycopodium) are well advanced on
finalising the EPC contract, accounting
Perseus Mining expects late-2017
start-up for Sissingué gold project
for approximately 50 % of the estimated
construction scope. The execution of
the EPC contract is currently scheduled
for this month (August) and, given that
all required licensing, permitting and
landowner compensation has been com-
pleted, re-commencement of site works is
expected to occur in the later stages of the
September 2016 quarter.
The full scale development of Sissingué
is intended to be financed through a mix of
equity finance (US$40 million) and project
debt finance (US$60 million).
Perseus says that given the quality of the
project planning and the assembled proj-
ect management team, construction and
commissioning of Sissingué is expected to
progress reasonably quickly with first pro-
duction of gold now scheduled to occur in
the December 2017 quarter.