Mining News: Northern Neighbors: Two Hope Bay milestones reached

TMAC Resources Inc. Aug. 29 reported the safe delivery of the processing plant to its Hope Bay gold mine project in Nunavut. “We remain on track to advance the Hope Bay Project towards commercial production in early 2017,” said TMAC CEO Catharine Farrow. “As of this week, the mill building is nearing full completion with the steel erected, the wall paneling and roofing installed and only some civil work remaining. We have initiated the movement of the recently off-loaded processing plant components into the mill building.” The processing plant was fabricated at Gekko Systems’ facilities in Australia and shipped to Hope Bay in northern Nunavut. The motor control components for the plant were shipped to Vancouver, trucked to Yellowknife and then flown to Hope Bay. This allowed for early arrival and installation of these components, which will expedite installation and commissioning of the processing plant. Other vital plant components, including thickeners, select conveyors and filter presses, arrived at site in an east coast freighter that offloaded at Hope Bay earlier in August. “With this critical portion of the 2016 sealift behind us we are now totally focused on assembling and commissioning the processing plant as planned. Additionally, the underground mining continues to advance smoothly. We remain on plan and budget and are making excellent progress toward building the first gold mine in what we believe to be Canada’s next gold mining district,” Farrow added.

Additionally, TMAC reported that Caroline Bennett, minister, Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada, has accepted the Nunavut Impact Review Board recommendation to allow TMAC’s proposed amendments to the Doris North gold project to proceed. TMAC is currently permitted to deposit 458,000 metric tons of tailings – about 1.5 years of currently planned production – into an already permitted tailings impoundment area. The requested amendment increases the tailings that may be deposited into the facility to 2.5 million metric tons, sufficient for the current life of mine production plan at Doris. With the minister approval, NIRB can now finalize the amended project certificate. It also allows the Nunavut Water Board to proceed with consideration of an amended water license. The public hearing on the new water license for Doris is scheduled for mid-September.

-Shane Lasley