Contained gold reserves at the Boddington deposit have increased by 616,000 oz., making the gold mine Australia’s largest. The additional reserves boost Boddington’s total minable reserves to 3.07 million oz., which almost matches the reserves available when the mine began operating in 1987, says 40% owner Reynolds Metals (NYSE).
The bulk of the added reserves is contained in material below the laterite zone, according to Douglas Jinks, Reynolds’ operations manager. These basement deposits, grading an average of 0.11 oz. per ton, are richer than the 68 million tons of laterite reserves.
The mine started operations with a design throughput of 3.3 million tons, and since then its annual capacity has doubled to 6.6 million tons. Boddington produced 424,100 oz. of gold in 1989.
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