Cauldron Energy Ltd (ASX:CXU) has completed a site visit at its Blackwood Gold Project in Victoria to initiate community engagement following the recent approval to drill and access the extensive underground tunnel system for sampling projected extensions of historic shafts and multiple gold reef intersections.
Initiation of community engagement is a key step to access the extensive historical underground workings because mapping and sampling will guide the company’s geology team in future exploration programs where larger samples may be taken.
This ability to take a larger sample than can be done by a diamond drill core is a statistical advantage for future mineralisation assessments to define gold content and could improve confidence in how the material will react under various processing regimes.
Low carbon footprint planned
Cauldron is committed to net zero carbon, with the planned operational approach at Blackwood to involve narrow extraction by the use of hand-held compressed air drilling equipment.
This approach allows surgical precision when developing or stoping the target material and also aligns with the narrow high-grade vein style of gold mineralisation at Blackwood.
It also allows use of the existing access infrastructure, leading to a low capital start-up with no process plant and no extensive access development capital which is usually required underground.
Cauldron chief executive officer Jess Oram said: “The synergies of minimising the volume of underground extraction align with the triple benefits of, a low carbon footprint, maximising grade providing low unit cost of transport and of downstream processing and minimal environmental impact for the community and environment - delivering both economic and environmental outcomes - and positions the company perfectly for complementary market expectations.”
Traditional mining methods
The company has specifically targeted gold mineralisation which - if exploration can prove the expected extensions - will facilitate a high-value low capital style of extraction as exhibited by the traditional mining techniques used between the 1860s and 1930s.
This approach requires the older underground mining skills and lower impact hand-held equipment both of which are disappearing from the Australian mining industry due to the focus on economies of scale of the larger diesel decline mines.
By minimising openings and using individual miners to close off the face it allows the miners and geologists to be selective in assigning which rock is taken as ore and waste.
This allows greater control of dilution with waste at the point of breakage meaning a maximisation of the grade by minimising the non-paying waste entering the ore stream.
Cost and processing benefits
The overriding benefit to the operation of not requiring large capital input for both a process plant and underground access infrastructure means the operation is not burdened with debt from the outset, allowing the initial funds to immediately flow back to the company.
Use of remote processing facilitated by the higher grades also means there would be no local tailings or use of process chemicals at the project.
In addition, the direct access to the geology underground allows geologists large rock exposures with which to improve their understanding of the gold distribution at the historical workings.