Alexandria`s prime competitors for mill spaceAs mentioned in the past, I see 4 of the 5 Val d`Or area mills needing higher grade ore to be efficient. They are small mills that cannot process heavy volumes to reduce fixed costs per unit (like bulk tonnage operations can). The Agnico mill is the only bulk tonnage mill in the area, in my opinion.
The area mills:
* Beacon (potentially now owned by private investors, but not a lot of info available to confirm)
* QMX mill
* Wesdome mill
* Lamaque mill (Integra)
* Goldex mill (Agnico)
One could also include Richmont`s Camflo Mill also, although it is further away.
1) Alexandria Minerals
Alexandria has 2 deposits in the area that should work well with the small mills.
Sleepy - 307,000 gold ounces of 5.10 g/t gold grade (Inferred). Strong, consistent, average deposit width of 4.0 - 5.0 metres.
Akasaba Main - about 525,000 gold ounces in total. This includes underground of 427,000 with 5.93 g/t grade gold M&I and 5.58 g/t grade gold Inferred. The open pit is 130,000 with mainly 1.37 g/t gold M&I and a bit at 1.93 g/t gold Inferred.
2) Adventure Gold
They have 770,000 ounces of gold at 2.63 g/t in the Inferred category. This is broken down as 330,000 ounces at 2.4 g/t Au in-pit resources within 225 metres of the surface and 394,000 ounces at 3.1 Au in underground bulk mining.
Although Adventure`s resource profile is not terrible, I don`t think it is ideal for the Val d`Or area small mills. In my opinion, Alexandria`s 5+ g/t grades will work much better.
3) Niogold
Officially, Niogold has 1,531,000 ounces in M&I at 1.48 g/t and 599,000 ounces in Inferred at 1.13 g/t gold.
I have some major concerns here. The Marban in-pit ounces (and likely the entire profile) was based on a gold price of US$1,540 (1.3 million ounces, with grades from .81 to 1.33 g/t Au), when the gold price is now around US$1,200.
In addition, they only have about 147K ounces in the underground (3.69 - 4.20 g/t grade). Everything else is very low grade.
I don`t see this resource, as it currently stands, as being economical for the small Val d`Or mills that depend heavily on 5+ g/t gold to be economical.
It seems like they are having success with some infill drilling at depth which could also lead to some high grade resource expansion at depth. No resource profile is available at depth though.
4) Monarques Gold
To be honest, I am not crazy at all about Monarques` deposit or their prefeasibility results at all.
Their resource profile is confusing, but best I can tell they seem to highlighting a version of 243,000 ounces (4 g/t cutoff), with 199K ounces of 9.08 g/t M&I and 44K ounces of 8.56 g/t Au Inferred - at Croinor. It`s confusing to me because they seem to be using something much higher for the prefeasibilty.
They are also located extremely far away from the mills they are targeting:
*Beacon - 60 km trucking distrance
*Aurbel (QMX) - 69 km
*Lamaque - 73 km
*Camflo - 105 km
In addition, their deposit seems to be extremely narrow and a bit unpreditable for my liking.
In my opinion, it will be a significant challenge to get it to work - strictly my opinion though. From their October 17, 2014 prefeasibility study news release:
``The proposed mine plan for the Croinor project involves the underground mining of narrow subvertical veins. A large portion of the identified resource dips at less than 45 degrees, and is not well - suited to longhole mining, as the broken ore does not flow easily. It is no better suited to room - and - pillar mining, as the dip makes it difficult for workers to navigate the stopes with equipment and materials. The dip of the Croinor Gold mineralization has led the Corporation to work with Minrail and InnovExplo to test the use of Minrail ’s S. A. M. S. TM technology noted Jean - Marc Lacoste.“ Chapter 24, “ Other Data and Relevant Information, is devoted to this, and discusses the assumption of using this technology, the potential for improving various operating aspects, the health and safety aspect and the potential savings that could substantially improve the economics of the Croinor Gold project.``
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