TIDMSGZ
RNS Number : 5933F
Scotgold Resources Ltd
28 July 2016
SCOTGOLD RESOURCES LIMITED
JUNE 2016 QUARTERLY ACTIVITIES REPORT
CONONISH GOLD AND SILVER PROJECT
Grant of Planning Permission
As announced on 29 April 2016, the Company received notification
from the Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park Planning
Authority ("LLTNPPA") that its application for "Change of use of
existing shed to processing plant, siting of container and
ancillary equipment, storage of residual material. (Temporary
Permission)" has been approved. This permission enabled the company
to proceed with its planned Bulk Processing Trial (BPT) at the
Cononish Gold and Silver Project site.
Bulk Processing Trial
As announced by the Company on 24 February 2016, the Cononish
Gold and Silver Project BPT, is a pilot scale processing trial. The
aims of the BPT are to demonstrate the marketability and
profitability of Scottish gold production from Cononish. It will
also give further confidence to metallurgical test-work already
completed and provide a basis for a review of the development plan
under the current Bankable Feasibility Study.
A stockpile of approximately 7,000t of ore grading around 7.9g/t
Au and 39g/t Ag is stockpiled on the mine 'platform' at Cononish.
The Company installed a small scale pilot plant (portable and skid
mounted) to treat around 2,400t (approximately 1,200 m3) of this
material over approximately a six-month period. The material to be
treated forms part of the Probable Reserves for the project (refer
ASX and AIM announcements dated 25/05/2015 and 26/05/2015
respectively).
The material is being treated through the plant which utilises
gravity separation via a centrifugal device, similar to the planned
full scale plant. However, for the purposes of the BPT, the
flotation circuit process is being replaced by a spiral bank to
generate a sulphide rich concentrate and therefore no chemicals
will be used on site as part of the BPT.
Bulk Processing Trial Underway
As announced by the Company on 15 June 2016 the BPT plant was
delivered, installed and commissioned and material has started to
be processed. Early observations regarding the BPT include:
-- Product assays suggest the feed grade is in line with the
expected 7.9g/t Au and 39g/t Ag estimated average for the
stockpile.
-- As expected, the impact crusher circuit results in a
relatively coarse product, with approximately 80% less than
400micron ("p80 400um"), compared with the final plant comminution
circuit which will be designed to achieve p80 150um.
-- At this Particle Size Distribution ("PSD"), the impact
crusher is proving very effective at liberating the contained
sulphides (which in turn are associated with the majority of the
gold content) and approximately 90% of the sulphides are
recoverable via the spiral and shaking table circuits.
-- It is estimated that approximately 75% of the contained gold
(including free gold) reports to the sulphide concentrate, with the
balance reporting to the quartz "tail" for future retreatment as
part of the final plant design.
-- The trial has also shown a separate galena (lead sulphide)
rich concentrate is achievable from the shaking table circuit,
which positively impacts on future treatment routes for the balance
of the sulphides and potentially could form a saleable
by-product.
-- Further treatment of the concentrate will be undertaken
during the BPT and this will ensure sufficient free gold is
available to demonstrate the marketability and profitability of
hallmarked Scottish gold production from Cononish. To this end the
Company has appointed The Dragonfly Initiative (a firm of
consultants specialising in this area and who have previously
assisted Scotgold) to manage this process.
Grampian Licences Renewed
As announced on 12 May 2016 the Company has concluded agreements
with the Crown Estates regarding the terms of its five Crown
Options (and corresponding future leases) that constitute its
Grampian Project in Scotland and in particular includes the highly
prospective target areas identified in the previously reported
structural study.
All Crown Options have initially been granted covering the same
areas as before, other than the previously notified agreed
reduction in the Inverliever option area of approximately 100km(2)
. The granted option areas comprising the Grampian Project now
cover approximately 4100km(2) (see Figure 1). The Company's
Cononish Gold and Silver Project, which already has a lease
granted, is unaffected by the provisions noted above. (A map
showing the location of the license can be found at
www.scotgoldresources.com.au).
Pomar Licence Awarded in Portugal
The Company also announced on 12 May 2016 that wholly owned
Portuguese subsidiary, Scotgold Resources Portugal Ltda, had been
granted an exploration licence for 3 years (with an option to
extend) in eastern central Portugal, near Castelo Branco.
The 'Pomar' licence (see Figure 2) covers 264km(2) and includes
the historic antimony (with gold) mines of das Gatas, Pomar and
Casalinho and numerous small scale antimony trials and occurrences.
These small high grade mines were active during the 1940's
producing antimony concentrate with associated gold. Some tungsten
mineralisation has been identified in the licence area associated
with the antimony / gold veins.
In the 1980's, Indumetal and Billiton (in joint venture)
conducted a brief exploration program consisting of tip sampling
and metallurgical testwork, soil and stream sediment sampling, hand
held geophysics and limited drilling before withdrawing from
antimony exploration. The Company will shortly commence the process
of accessing historical exploration data through the relevant
Portuguese authorities and determining what modern exploration
techniques could be appropriate.
The focus of exploration is to examine potential extensions to
the existing mines as well as examining the regional prospectivity
for antimony / gold presented by the other occurrences and trials.
In addition, previous exploration has identified two antimony /
gold bearing regional scale felsite dykes which warrant systematic
exploration.
The licence area is situated 40kms south of the world class tin
tungsten mine at Panasqueira, which has produced more than 100,000t
WO3 concentrate in over 100 years of production. (A Pomar
Exploration license map can be found at
www.scotgoldresources.com.au).
Further, as announced by the Company on 25 July 2016 a party of
Scotgold staff and independent consultants visited the Pomar
licence area to conduct an initial site visit. The Scotgold party
was accompanied by independent consultant, Mr. Peter Flindell, an
exploration geologist with a background in a wide range of
commodities and of bringing exploration projects to commercial
production.
Re-evaluation of the mineralisation during the site visit
indicated there may be two separate mineralising events, an early
antimony and later gold event. This opens up the potential for
undiscovered gold prospects in zones with quartz-only
mineralisation, given previous exploration efforts have focused on
antimony mineralisation in the region.
The initial program proposed for the Pomar licence area is
modest (GBP30,000) and consists of historical data collection &
analysis, a mapping program and a soil sampling assay program.
There is significant historical data available from previous
exploration companies, including Billiton and Indumetal, comprising
assay results and geophysical data. The Company intends to access
and evaluate the historical data available in the licence area to
aid further exploration efforts.
The soil sampling program is based around existing samples taken
by the previous licence holder. These samples were not analysed,
providing a great opportunity for Scotgold to gain a large volume
of data quickly and cost-effectively and gather an overview of gold
occurrences in the licence area. This field work will be supervised
by our Country Manager Joao Barros, a geologist with extensive
local knowledge and previous work experience of the Pomar licence
area, under the guidance of Scotgold Projects Geologist Dr Nyree
Hill.
A mapping program will focus on stratigraphic and structural
mapping to identify the possibility for more wide scale gold
occurrences and aid understanding the controls on mineralisation
types across the Pomar licence area. This work is anticipated to be
completed by Dr. Pablo Gumiel and Dr. Monica Arias, who have an
existing working relationship with the Company having carried out
the highly successful structural study within the Grampian Project
last year.
CORPORATE
Appointment and Resignation of Directors
Following the resignation of Mr Richard Harris as Director as
announced on 4 April 2016, Mr Gabriel Chiappini, who also acts the
Company Secretary, was appointed as a Director of the Company as
announced 27 May 2016. The Board welcomes Mr Chiappini as a
Director, and looks forward to his expanded contribution to the
Company.
Exercise of Options
As previously announced on 14 April 2016 the Company issued
20,593,750 fully paid ordinary shares following the exercise of
options prior to their expiry on 31 March 2016. The options were
exercisable at A$0.012 (approximately GBP0.0063) raising A$247,125
(approximately GBP129,740).
As previously announced on 16 June 2016 the Company issued a
further 359,471 fully paid ordinary shares following the exercise
of options. The options were exercisable at GBP0.01 (approximately
$0.02) and had an expiry date of 30 September 2017.
SUMMARY
This has once again been a busy quarter with the prime focus
being on the successful implementation of the BPT. The supply,
transport, installation and commissioning went extremely well and
led into the initial operational phase, where the emphasis was on
training, procedures and customising the work area for safety,
efficiency and sustainability. This having been achieved, we are
now focussing on monitoring the plant performance to determine the
optimum throughput and to inform our thinking of the final design
for the full scale plant.
Not withstanding the immediate focus on Cononish and the BPT in
particular, we continue to look at ways to position the Company for
long term growth. In this regard we are pleased to have reached new
agreements with the Crown Estate which provide improved security
through longer terms, amongst other things, on our key portfolio of
exploration assets in Scotland (the Grampian Project).
In addition we have acquired a new exploration licence in
Portugal, and we look forward seeing what potential will be
highlighted from the preliminary work scheduled in the coming
months.
Gabriel Chiappini
Company Secretary
Forward Looking Statements
This announcement contains certain statements that may
constitute "forward looking statements". Such statements are only
predictions and are subject to inherent risks and uncertainties,
which could cause actual values, results, performance achievements
to differ materially from those expressed, implied or projected in
any forward looking statements.
Competent Person's Statement
The information in this report that relates to the 2015 Ore
Reserves for Cononish Gold Project (refer ASX announcement dated
25/05/2015) is based on information compiled by Pat Willis, a
Competent Person who is registered as a Professional Engineer
(Pr.Eng.) with the Engineering Council for South Africa (ECSA) and
a Fellow in good standing and Past President of the Southern Africa
Institute of Mining and Metallurgy (FSAIMM). Mr Willis is employed
by Bara Consulting Limited, an independent consulting company. Mr
Willis has sufficient experience which is relevant to the style of
mineralisation and type of deposit under consideration and to the
activity which he is undertaking to qualify as a Competent Person
as defined in the 2012 Edition of the 'Australasian Code for
Reporting of Exploration Results, Mineral Resources and Ore
Reserves'. Mr Willis has reviewed and consents to the inclusion in
the report of the matters based on his information in the form and
context in which it appears.
The information in this report that relates to the 2015 Mineral
Resources Estimate for Cononish Gold Project (refer ASX
announcement dated 22/01/2015) is based on information compiled by
Malcolm Titley, a Competent Person who is a Member of The
Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy. Mr Titley is
employed by CSA Global (UK) Limited, an independent consulting
company. Mr Titley has sufficient experience which is relevant to
the style of mineralisation and type of deposit under consideration
and to the activity which he is undertaking to qualify as a
Competent Person as defined in the 2012 Edition of the
'Australasian Code for Reporting of Exploration Results, Mineral
Resources and Ore Reserves'. Mr Titley consents to the inclusion in
the report of the matters based on his information in the form and
context in which it appears.
Further, the Company confirms it is not aware of any new
information or data that materially affects the information
contained in the original announcements and that all material
assumptions and technical parameters underpinning the estimate of
Resources and Reserves continue to apply and have not materially
changed.
For further information please contact:
Scotgold Resources Stockdale Securities Capital Markets Vicarage Capital
Limited Limited Consultants Limited
------------------- --------------------- ----------------- -----------------
Richard Gray Robert Finlay/ Simon Rothschild Rupert Williams
- CEO Ed Thomas
------------------- --------------------- ----------------- -----------------
Tel: +44 (0)1838 Tel: +44 (0)20 Tel +44 (0)7703 Tel: +44 (0)20
400 306 7601 6100 167 065 3651 2911
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Tenement details
The Company holds a Lease (100%) from the Crown Estate
Commissioners over Cononish Farm, county of Perth, Scotland UK.
The Company holds a Lease (100%) from the landowner over
Cononish Farm, county of Perth, Scotland UK.
The Company holds five Mines Royal Option Agreements (100%) with
the Crown Estate Commissioners as detailed below:
-- Glen Orchy: Location - counties of Perth and Argyll, Scotland UK
-- Glen Lyon: Location - counties of Perth and Argyll, Scotland UK
-- Inverliever: Location - counties of Dunbarton, Argyll and Perth, Scotland UK
-- Knapdale: Location - county of Argyll, Scotland UK
-- Ochils: Location - county of Clackmannan, Perth, Kinross and Stirling, Scotland UK
The Company announced on 12 May 2016 that wholly owned
Portuguese subsidiary, Scotgold Resources Portugal Ltda, had been
granted the Pomar Licence. The Company now owns a 100% interest in
the Pomar Licence which is valid for 3 years (with an option to
extend) and covers 264km(2) in eastern central Portugal, near
Castelo Branco.
No other beneficial interests are held in any farm-in or
farm-out agreements.
No other beneficial interests in farm-in or farm out agreements
were acquired or disposed of during the quarter
This information is provided by RNS
The company news service from the London Stock Exchange
END
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