Vista Gold’s Batman Returns Good Scoping Study

Vista Gold (VGZ-T, VGZ-N) plans to move ahead with a prefeasibility study on the Batman deposit at its Mt. Todd gold project in Australia’s Northern Territory after learning the results of a preliminary economic assessment.

President and chief operating officer Fred Earnest said the last two years of exploration work have paid off.

“The results of the PEA are very encouraging,” Earnest said in a statement.

The study looked at three different scenarios using a US$750- per-oz. gold price. The first conered sidered mining measured, indicated and inferred resources from an open pit at a rate of 30,000 tonnes of ore per day grading 0.42 gram gold per tonne. The mine would be in production for 15.2 years, producing a total of 3.7 million oz. gold.

The project would have a pretax net present value (NPV) of US$233 million and an internal rate of return (IRR) of 21.6%. Capital costs would be US$323 million and life of mine capital, US$418 million.

The next scenario, also a 30,000- tonne-per-day open pit, consid- only measured and indicated resources, resulting in lower production of 2.6 million oz. over a shorter mine life of 8.9 years. The average gold grade was higher at 0.58 gram gold per tonne.

This time, the pretax NPV comes in around US$212 million with an IRR of 23.1%. Capital costs were estimated at US$340 million with US$380 million for life-of-mine costs.

And finally in the third scenario, the study again considered measured, indicated and inferred resources, but this time with a lower average grade of 0.34 gram gold and an operation twice the size, mining 60,000 tonnes of ore per day. Total production was estimated at 5.1 million oz. gold over 11.9 years.

The pretax NPV was US$302 million and the IRR was 20.4%. Capital costs would be US$494 million, while life-of-mine capital was projected at US$567 million.

The Batman deposit has measured and indicated resources of 191 million tonnes grading 0.84 gram gold for a total of 5.1 million oz. gold.

Inferred resources stand at 94 million tonnes grading 0.74 gram gold for 2.2 million oz. gold.