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Ground Breakers: Norseman gold project up and running, Beament chases the energy transition with zinc-copper upgrade
Mining
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- Pantoro and Tulla reach ‘practical completion’ on time and budget for 108,000ozpa Norseman gold mine
- Bill Beament’s Develop Global plans DFS early next year on Sulphur Springs zinc-copper mine in WA
After eight years in the wilderness, Pantoro (ASX:PNR) and Tulla Resources (ASX:TUL) have completed their mission to revive the Norseman gold mine, one of the historic operations of the WA Goldfields.
The longest continuously operating gold mine in Australia when it shut in 2014 after 79 years in action, the mine started in the early days of the Western Mining Corporation has an invidious history.
An historically high grade operations, Norseman became better known for its tragic safety record and financial struggles than its bountiful resource in the early years of the 2010s.
It has been given a new lease on life though by Pantoro and its JV partner Tulla, listed last year by MAC services founder Kevin Maloney.
The 50-50 owners announced the practical completion of a new 1Mtpa processing plant on time and budget by GR Engineering today, with ore commissioning now under way and 140,000t of ore from the Scotia mining centre and OK underground mine available for milling.
“Achieving practical completion on time, and on budget is an outstanding result considering the recent cost increases and delays experienced across the wider industry,” PNR boss Paul Cmrlec said.
“I thank and congratulate the team at Pantoro for their substantial efforts to stay on track and hit the objective. I also commend the performance of GR Engineering in delivering the project.”
Located in a 5.5Moz gold field, the project contains a mineral resource of 4.7Moz with an ore reserve of 900,000oz, with plans to produce 108,000ozpa over an initial seven year mine life.
Pantoro (ASX:PNR) and Tulla (ASX:TUL) share prices today:
Speaking of new mines …
Bill Beament’s Develop (ASX:DVP), which the former gold bull wants to use as a vehicle to develop zinc and copper mines to supply the battery sector, is targeting a DFS in early 2023 after a major resource upgrade today at its Sulphur Springs mine in the Pilbara.
Develop has ramped up infill and resource drilling at Sulphur Springs since the company’s rebrand last year and Beament’s introduction as the mining services/exploration company’s MD last year.
It says indicated resources at Sulphur Springs have increased 32% to 1.16Mt of zinc equivalent, with a total resource of 13.8Mt at 5.7% zinc, 1.1% copper, 0.3% lead, 22g/t silver and 0.2g/t gold for a zinc equivalent 9.3%.
The previous resource contained 13.4Mt at 8.1% ZnEq, with Develop saying its zinc and silver grades have increased 50% and 15% respectively.
The mine has environmental approval, with Beament lauding the upgrade as an “outstanding result”.
“This is an outstanding result which demonstrates that Sulphur Springs now has scale and therefore is well on track to becoming a significant producer of the zinc and copper which will be in huge demand as part of the energy transition,” he said.
“With 90 per cent of the increased Resource now in the Indicated category, we are highly confident about the outlook for Sulphur Springs and the key role it will play in Develop’s portfolio of producing assets.
“Our focus is now on completing the mine designs, which will include our revised strategy of starting underground in order to access the more favourable primary ore first.
“This will increase free cashflow generation and reduce development risk.”
It is one of two mines Beament is looking to bring online, along with the Woodlawn zinc-copper project in NSW picked up from the administrators of Heron Resources last year, while Develop also has the mining services contract at Bellevue Gold’s (ASX:BGL) mine of the same name in WA.
