Arizona Gold & Silver Inc (TSX-V:AZS, OTCQB:AZASF) CEO Mike Stark talked with Proactive about the latest metallurgical testing at the Philadelphia project and its potential impact on project economics.
Stark discussed how switching to high-pressure crushing has significantly improved gold recovery rates from previous testing.
Proactive: Welcome back inside our Proactive newsroom. And joining me now is Mike Stark. He is the CEO of Arizona Gold & Silver. And Mike, it's good to have you back again. How are you?
Mike Stark: Great. Thank you. Thank you for the opportunity to be here.
You were out with some news talking about some testing you did on some bulk samples at Philadelphia and getting some of these results back — showing again some positivity. Why don't you take us through what you see?
Sure. Very, very strong results. After the initial tests that we did, we're now going to a high-pressure crush. This is significant. We’re getting 10% more, which we have now accomplished. We’re looking at 80% recovery. It’s a big difference to the bottom line for someone that looks to put this into production. A very significant difference.
Yeah. Talk about that. How does that 10%, as you mentioned, make that big of a difference?
Well, let's even minimize that. We're going to leave the solution in and go out a longer time period. If we can go from 80 to 85%, which looks very achievable, it'll make about USD 105 million difference to the bottom line, Steve, on just 500,000 ounces. Again, this is not NI 43-101 compliant, to be clear — but based on metrics. These are true numbers. 500,000 ounces — that’s USD 105 million to the bottom line. Very significant. People say small increments — they’re major. When you’ve got a USD 4,200 gold price, it makes a big difference.
Absolutely. We should also mention that drilling is still continuing in Philadelphia. In fact, it's restarted. Tell me what the program is doing. I know there’s a lot going on there right now.
There is. Hole 157 is underway. It’s going to go along strike to the northeast of Hole 156, where we encountered 22 metres of nine grams. My vision through Greg — my VP [of exploration] as you know — is that we could be going into more of the centre of the vein at this location. We won’t know until we drill it, but the graphics are showing us that the vein is moving in this direction, which is obviously quite significant. If we can get into the centre, that could be where the richer zone is to be found.
All right. We’ll wait to see what happens there. I should also get a quick update while I have you — Silverton, and more specifically about antimony. That word has been bandied around the last little while, especially the last couple of weeks. Talk to everyone about antimony and the significance of it.
The significance is really quite simple. The American government has been cut off by the supply chain from China. So now they have to secure their own. Of course, it's being talked about heavily — where do we get the source? There is a processing plant in Montana, which is just one state over from us. Silverton has a lot to offer. It has to be drilled to be proven. But the significance of a 400 metre by 900 metre target is huge to the bottom line — again, to another company that wants to produce antimony.
Quotes have been lightly edited for clarity and style