In a recent interview with Proactive, George Bee, CEO of US Gold Corp (NASDAQ:USAU), discussed the developments of the CK Gold project in Wyoming. Bee highlighted the strategic advantages of the project's location, emphasizing Wyoming's resource-friendly environment and infrastructure. The state supports mining activities, which align well with US Gold Corp (NASDAQ:USAU)'s operations.
Proactive: George, you recently compared your CK gold project to other projects you've worked on at an investor conference in New York. Could you tell us what does make it attractive?
George Bee: The theme was "location, location, location.” When evaluating projects, you have to consider where you're situated and the circumstances surrounding that.
When examining the technical aspects of a project, you also have to consider the jurisdiction, including the rules of the game where you're working, political stability, and cost considerations associated with the location. This includes geography and logistics. Additionally, you need to think about labor availability, infrastructure, and social and economic acceptance. These are all the topics I touched upon, and it was a good meeting.
Let's start with the location. George, take us through why Wyoming is a good location or a good jurisdiction to work in.
Okay, so looking at Wyoming, it's a resource-rich state with a population of about 660,000. Much of the state's revenue comes from the resource sector, including coal, oil, gas, trona, and some uranium. However, with no new power stations being built, coal's importance is diminishing.
Diversification with gold and copper-gold projects is very attractive for Wyoming. We're located in the southeast corner of the state, about 20 miles outside of Cheyenne, the capital. There is existing mining activity in the area, including a large quarry just three miles south of us.
When people think of Wyoming, they often think of Yellowstone Park and Jackson Hole. If we were situated there, we wouldn't be having this conversation. But we're in the southeast corner, a mining area within a mining-friendly jurisdiction.
What else makes this mine stand apart?
We've done a lot of groundwork explaining what we want to do and how we want to do it. We really haven't faced any serious opposition to our proposed plan for what is essentially a clean operation.
We mine the rock, which looks like a quarry, process the ore material, develop the concentrate, and then ship that concentrate to a smelter. There are no nasty chemicals associated with the project, no smokestack emissions, and very little impact on the local environment.
You may have heard that we're experiencing difficulties with water and there's a great demand for it. Considering this, we decided from the beginning to include a dry stack tailings pile and recycle all of our water.
We chose not to use conventional tailings. Instead, we squeeze the water out to recycle it, and then stack the tailings onto a heap on a pad for containment.
You've already received a mine operating permit, but it is conditional. You've already met some of those conditions. Can you take us through them?
There are two major permits that we needed. One was the industrial siting permit, which we obtained last year. In April this year, we received our mine operating permit, conditional on getting a water discharge permit, a reclamation bond in place, and an air quality permit. The first two, the water discharge permit and the reclamation bond, are already in place.
We anticipate having the air quality permit shortly, so we're ready to go.
What are the next steps once you’ve received those final permits?
We're finalizing all the conditions from our permitting exercise into our engineering studies and talking to local providers and companies. We're very fortunate with our location. We're situated on I-80 and I-25, two major interstate highways.
We have Gillette, Wyoming, an hour and a half to our south, and Salt Lake City four hours to our west. From this perspective, all the major equipment suppliers are within easy reach. We're about 20 miles outside of Cheyenne.
Compared to other projects I've been involved with, where we've had to build man camps for remote operations, construct roads, and power lines, all the necessary infrastructure is already in place here. It's a straightforward build with lots of local talent available. Additionally, workers can go home at night, making it an attractive place to work during a time when there is significant competition for skilled labor.
Quotes have been lightly edited for style and clarity