Meeka Metals is bulking up and oh-so-close to being ready to drop its major pre-feasibility study with the help of St Anne’s. Pic via Getty Images.
Mining
Exceptional gold recoveries pave the way for St Anne’s to add quality ounces to Meeka Metals’ Murchison Pre-feasibility Study, due mid-2023.
Meeka Metals (ASX:MEK) is in the home stretch to its major pre-feasibility study for the 1.1Moz Murchison gold project, which includes the high grade ‘Andy Well’ mine.
Andy Well produced 350,000oz at ripper grades of more than 8g/t for Doray Minerals between 2013 and 2017 before its merger with Silver Lake Resources.
But there is significant value to be added by St Anne’s, where an initial resource remains on track for the March 2023 quarter.
Meanwhile, Meeka says metallurgical test work confirms conventional carbon-in-leach (CIL) gold recoveries averaging 98% for St Anne’s.
Gravity gold recovery (the most cost-effective recovery method) achieved up to 82.1% (average 48.5%).
Adding to the positive outcome were rapid leach kinetics (average recoveries of 91.1% achieved after 4 hours and 94.7% after 8 hours); low leach residue tail grades for all tests (average 0.08g/t Au); and low cyanide consumption.
“High gold recoveries, rapid leach kinetics and low cyanide consumption, coupled with the shallow, high-grade oxide nature of the mineralisation, points to St Anne’s making a meaningful contribution to the Pre-feasibility Study due in mid-2023,” Meeka managing director Tim Davidson says.
“With this in mind, the initial St Anne’s Mineral Resource remains on track for the March 2023 quarter, allowing the impact of this additional Mineral Resource on our other mining centres and mill sizing to be optimised.”
A scoping study last December showed the Murchison project would generate pre-tax undiscounted cash flow of $182m at an A$2400/oz gold price (currently $2,650/oz), with life of mine EBITDA of $457m from production of 422,000oz of gold over eight years at all in sustaining costs of $1655/oz.
This article was developed in collaboration with Meeka Metals, a Stockhead advertiser at the time of publishing.
This article does not constitute financial product advice. You should consider obtaining independent advice before making any financial decisions.
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