Milling & Concentrating

The ore that is dug out of the ground requires processing prior to being sold. A typical disseminated deposit grade of 2 grams/tonne will be upgraded to either a concentrate grading about 5% gold or a doré brick grading about 50% gold (50% = 500 000 grams/tonne).

Conventional Cyanide Leaching

Cyanide leaching has been the processing option of choice in the precious metals industry since it was invented in the 1800's. The ore is crushed ground to flour-like size and is then mixed with process solution containing sodium cyanide. The gold and silver will dissolve in the process solution and can then be precipitated in a form that can be smelted into a high grade doré brick.

Capital costs: moderate
Operating costs: low
Gold recovery: 90%
Environmental risk: low risk of toxic spill, but would cause large amount of damage

Gravity Separation

Gravity separation uses machines separate heavy particles of ore (the gold) from the lighter particles of ore (waste tailings). No chemicals are used in a gravity separation plant. Several stages of this density based separation are required in order to get a good enough grade of concentrate to smelt into a doré brick

This option does not work as efficiently as the two chemical based options, and much gold is lost and ends up in the tailings. In addition, the large number of machines required to make this option work for large tonnage operations consume a huge amount of power and demand a large work force to operate. This option is really only practical for either the small open pit or underground mining options. The large open pit produces far too much ore to be efficiently processed by gravity.

Capital costs: high
Operating costs: high
Gold recovery: 65%
Environmental risk: none

Flotation Separation

This process used a number of organic chemicals that are similar to pine oil with machines that blow air through an agitated pulp of ore and water. The gold particles will stick to the air bubbles and be collected from the top of the tank. The concentrate of gold and other metals will need to be sold to a smelter for further processing before the gold may be sold.

At present there are no Canadian smelters available to smelt our concentrate. If we choose this processing option, then we will have to sell our concentrate overseas and we will make significantly less money than the two milling options that produce doré bricks.

Capital costs: moderate
Operating costs: moderate
Gold recovery: 85%
Environmental risk: low risk of a toxic spill, and it would cause minimal damage if it occurred.