Ads slam mining — Mean, green offensive targets Crown Jewel

“They take the gold. We keep the cyanide.” So warns a full-page advertisement in the April 12 issues of The Spokesman-Review and The New York Times (western edition).

It is the latest blow in an attack on Crown Resources (TSE) and Battle Mountain Gold (NYSE) by environmental groups. The joint-venture partners are in the process of developing and permitting a large open-pit gold operation in northeastern Washington state and environmentalists are intent on halting the process.

The advertisement, paid for by the Washington Environmental Council, the Washington Wilderness Coalition and Okanagan Highlands Alliance, urges readers to join the protest by mailing signed coupons to Governor Michael Lowry, State Senator Bradley Owens and Representative Wesley Pruitt. The effort is aimed at stopping what the groups call “cyanide-leach gold mines that have blighted so many other Western states.”

The groups are lobbying to have a moratorium placed on new mines in Washington until “we have regulations strong enough to protect our state’s rare natural beauty and environmental quality.”

The advertisement, sensational in tone, likens cyanide mining for gold to dynamiting for fish.

The groups refer to an operation “dumping thousands of tons of cyanide over low-grade ore, leaving a devastated contaminated moonscape.” In fact, Battle Mountain and Crown plan to operate a 3,000-ton-per-day carbon-in-leach mill at Buckhorn Mountain. There are no plans whatsoever to carry out heap-leaching.

The type of mill proposed is the same as that being operated 30 miles to the south at the Kettle River gold mine of Echo Bay Mines (TSE). Crown President Christopher Herald doesn’t expect the lobby to succeed in bringing about a moratorium on new mines. He notes that a move to include a moratorium in a House resolution bill calling for a study of mine regulations was quashed recently.

The bill, as originally stated, is expected to be passed in the near future, allowing for a study of regulations in Washington state this summer. Mining industry representatives say they are confident the study will find current regulations more than adequate. In any event, the Crown Jewel partners expect to draft an Environmental Impact Statement by July with final approval targeted for year-end or early 1994.

Herald said there is little local opposition to the mine, noting that the Okanagan County Commissioners passed a unanimous resolution supporting its development.

Battle Mountain is earning a 51% interest in the project by bringing it into production at a minimum rate of 3,000 tons

per day.

There is no provision for capital payback in the earn-in agreement, with operating profits split 49-51 from day one.

If permitting goes smoothly, production will begin in the first half of 1995 with a projected output of 175,000 oz. per year at an average cost of about US$165 per oz.

Proven and probable reserves were last estimated at 8.7 million tons grading 0.18 oz. gold per ton with a strip ratio of 11-to-1.