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February 2016
MODERN MINING
13
MINING News
Aureus Mining Inc, listed on the TSX and
AIM, has provided an operational update
(issued 22 January) for its New Liberty
Gold Mine in Liberia. The mine – commis-
sioned in 2015 – suffered a crusher failure
in October which halted production at the
mine for a short period.
Since the resumption of processing
operations at New Liberty on 30 October
2015, the ball mill has been operating at an
average of 82 % for 81 days (to 22 January)
of its designed capacity, including planned
downtime for ongoing optimisation. While
the criteria for the declaration of com-
mercial production have been reached,
Aureus has experienced issues during the
final phase of commissioning in the grav-
ity and CIL circuits of the plant, affecting
plant recoveries and resulting in an impact
on cash flow. It says it therefore does not
feel it is prudent to officially declare com-
mercial production at this point.
The company continues to focus on
fine-tuning and improving the opera-
“Unexpected challenges” at New Liberty
tional performance of the gravity circuit
and further optimising CIL leach kinet-
ics, with various options being evaluated
and systematically implemented in order
to improve overall plant performance to
within design specifications.
Aureus say it is anticipated that plant
performance will improve to design levels
by the end of Q1 2016, when the company
intends to declare full commercial produc-
tion at New Liberty.
Mining operations at New Liberty are
progressing, with fresh ore run of mine
(ROM) stockpiles currently standing at
83 509 tonnes at a grade of 2,78 g/t and
oxide and transitional stockpiles at 75 248
tonnes at a grade of 1,35 g/t.
To date, the process plant has processed
386 262 tonnes of ROM fresh sulphide ore
and lower grade oxide material resulting
in 19 shipments of gold doré from New
Liberty for smelting and refining at the
MKS PAMP refinery in Switzerland, totalling
20 835 ounces of gold.
Gold production achieved for the calen-
dar year 2015 was 17 172 ounces, against a
target of 27 000 ounces, and 3 663 ounces
of gold have been produced to date in
2016, with production since mid-Decem-
ber hampered by issues experienced
during the final phases of plant commis-
sioning. Performance from the gravity
circuit of the plant has not yet reached
design specifications, resulting in overall
gold recoveries of approximately 70 %
throughout December 2015 and early
January 2016.
Commenting, David Reading, President
and Chief Executive Officer of Aureus
Mining, said: “The commissioning phase
of New Liberty has brought some unex-
pected challenges; however, the recent
progress being made and improved
performance of the process plant are
encouraging. I am confident that the
various process improvements that our
experienced operations team are system-
atically implementing will continue to
improve the overall plant performance
towards design specifications.”