Chilean authorities have approved El Morro’s environmental impact assessment, joint-venture partners Goldcorp (G-T, GG-N) and New Gold (NGD-T, NGD-X), report.
Goldcorp owns 70% of the advanced stage copper-gold project in northern Chile and New Gold 30%.
On a 100% basis, El Morro contains proven and probable reserves of 6.7 million ounces of gold and 5.7 billion pounds of copper with an additional 2.2 million ounces of gold and 1 billion pounds of copper in the measured and indicated categories.
Goldcorp, which is the project operator, will start condemnation drilling and subsequent exploration drilling will focus on in-fill drilling and sampling for metallurgical and geo-technical data.
The partners say they will update El Morro’s feasibility study in the third quarter of this year and include revised capital and operating cost estimates and tweaks to the mine plan and mining equipment.
Results of the feasibility study included an initial capital investment of $2.5 billion and $356 million in sustaining capital over the 14-year mine life, for a total life-of-mine capital investment of $2.9 billion. Using prices of $2.80 per lb. copper and US$625 per oz. gold, the feasibility study demonstrated an after-tax internal rate of return of 14.7% and a net present value of $1.1 billion when discounted at 8%.
Annual metal production was estimated to be 203,000 tonnes of copper and 302,000 ounces of gold during El Morro’s first five years of production, and 172,000 tonnes of copper and 313,000 ounces of gold over the entire fourteen year life-of-mine with payback of the capital investment after 4.7 years.
El Morro is about 80 km east of the city of Vallenar and 650 km north of Santiago.
Be the first to comment on "El Morro’s EIA gets the green light (March 17, 2011)"