The gold dore bar poured with associated copper concentrate production from the SART plant continues to ramp up
The White Dam gold project is located 80km west of Broken Hill. (Credit: Steve Bidmead from Pixabay.)
GBM Resources and its joint venture (JV) partner Round Oak Minerals have announced the first gold dore bar pour at the White Dam mine in South Australia.
Located 80km west of Broken Hill, the White Dam gold project includes includes the open pit mine, dump / heap leach, the gold extraction plant and related infrastructure.
In July, GBM executed a joint venture agreement on the White Dam gold-copper heap leach operation with Round Oak Minerals.
The company said that the gold dore bar was poured with associated copper concentrate production from the sulphidisation-acidification-recycling-thickening (SART) plant that has continued to ramp up production.
SART Plant at White Dam project will extract copper from the gold leach solution
The SART Plant is designed to extract copper from the gold leach solution to improve overall gold recoveries.
The firm has also identified optimisation opportunities that are expected to result in increased production and reduce costs at the White Dam gold mine.
GBM Resources managing director and CEO Peter Rohner said: “While recent rain has resulted in some minor delays, the additional water is set to drive increased heap leach irrigation and thus higher gold and copper production in the near term.
“We are now working to finalise shipping of the first copper concentrates once the concentrate drying process is completed.
“The SART Plant is meeting its design objectives of removing copper and increasing the recovery of the cyanide solution back into the circuit to increase gold recoveries, which together enhance the overall economics of the White Dam operation.”
Furthermore, GBM h has also began evaluating the project’s remaining resources of 4.6 million tonnes averaging 0.7 grams per tonne of gold for 101,900 ounces of gold to determine the viability of the extraction and leaching of the material.
In July this year, Horizonte Minerals, a nickel development company, has poured the first gold from the first stage of its Boorara Gold mine in Western Australia.