Horizon boosts bottom line with toll milling
ASX-listed gold producer Horizon Minerals has boosted its bottom line by $1.35 million after toll milling stockpiled low-grade ore from its Boorara open pit mine in the renowned WA Goldfields. The company reports the processing of nearly 100,000 tonnes of low-grade stockpiles from the recent trial mining of the Boorara deposit is now complete.
The ore grade reconciled nine per cent above the mine claimed grade and provided further valuable geological information on grade allocation processes. Gravity recovery was again high at 35 per cent with reagent consumption and throughput rates in line with expectation. Since the turn of the new year the price of gold has been sitting above $2,500 an ounce that encouragingly exceeds the value of $2,000 an ounce outlined in the company’s Boorara Stage 1 Feasibility Study 2020.
Running the trial mined dirt through the Lakewood toll milling facility generated a welcome pay day in a strong gold price environment. More importantly, the operation aimed to de-risk the company’s larger development plans for the Boorara deposit.
The toll mill operation was a solid test of the economics and will help guide the company in its decision to outlay a large amount capital in constructing its own mill. Whist the toll mill campaigns were profitable, pushing its dirt through an inhouse mill could capture more margin for the company and its shareholders.
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Horizon picks up more Kalgoorlie gold assets
Horizon Minerals has officially taken control of Aurenne Group’s Cannon, Glandore and Cowarna gold projects, comprised of 22 granted tenement licenses covering approximately 180 square kilometres within a short trucking distance from Horizon’s 100 per cent owned Boorara gold project in Kalgoorlie. Resource and reserve models are well advanced at the Cannon underground gold mine providing a near-term development opportunity for the company.
The three gold projects were acquired from privateer Aurenne Group Holdings for a total consideration of $5 million in cash. $2.5 million was transferred at settlement and the remaining $2.5 million will be transferred either 12 months from settlement, or upon first gold production from the Cannon underground gold mine, whichever comes first. Horizon’s baseload mining proposal is from its Boorara project located approximately 20 km east of the Kalgoorlie Superpit
It also has plenty of other options to draw from including its 100 per cent owned Rose Hill, Binduli, Teal and Kalpini satellite deposits. The company expects the bundle of projects to underpin the proposed construction of a stand-alone processing plant at Boorara. With a new suite of advanced exploration targets in close proximity to the Boorara gold project set to bolster Horizon’s already burgeoning portfolio, the company is racing towards production now whilst arming itself with an almost never ending plethora of deposits to draw from.
Horizon releases Kalpini gold resource after stellar drill hits
Horizon Minerals has released a new mineral resource estimate for its Kalpini project about 65 kilometres northeast of Kalgoorlie-Boulder in Western Australia. The revised resource weighs in at 1.87 million tonnes grading 2.33 grams per tonne for 139,000 ounces of the precious yellow metal.
Kalpini is one of six key satellite gold deposits that underpins Horizon’s proposed flagship Boorara gold production hub about 15km east of Kalgoorlie.
That Horizon has managed to pick up so many projects and do so many deals around Kalgoorlie should come as no surprise to punters that know its board members. Jon Price is the original quintessential mining man. He is as much metallurgist as he is businessman and he is just as at home doing deals in the front bar of the Palace Hotel in Kalgoorlie as he is in the boardrooms of West Perth.
Company Chairman, Ashok Parekh is a bit like beach sand in so much as he gets into everything. He is often referred to as the unofficial Mayor of Kalgoorlie and his network of contacts is extreme and two tiered. On the one hand he can be seen drinking and doing deals with the region’s prospectors at The Tatts Club in Kalgoorlie most Friday nights and equally, he mixes it with some of the biggest names in mining on a regular basis.
The third major cog to the Horizon wheel is non-executive Director Peter Bilbe who, as the Chairman of the $6.8b Independence Group has impeccable blue chip credentials and a string of mining successes to his name.
