Artemis Gold Inc. (TSXV: ARTG) announces that it has committed to additional investments as part of its Phase 1 development of the Blackwater Mine. In support of these investments, it has amended its gold stream agreement with Wheaton Precious Metals Corp. which will provide an additional C$54M in funding.
The investments include additional structural steel and increased conveyor belt widths in the crushing circuits, as well as the introduction of variable-speed-drives to the ball mill. Electrical components have also been upgraded to facilitate the Phase 2 requirements and to include optionality in relation to the use of redundancy back-up power sources.
Other optimizations include upsizing of the oxygen plant coupled with down-shaft-sparging of oxygen to the pre-leach and carbon-in-leach (CIL) trains, along with the optimization of the CIL layout to facilitate non-intrusive expansion, as well as full conversion of the detoxification process to remove the need for tanker-supplied liquid sulphur dioxide.
The cost of these additions, together with over-budget expenditures on permitting costs and additional bonding costs connected to those permits, will require additional funding of approximately C$50M.
The initial capital to complete to first gold pour is now estimated to range between C$730M and C$750M, of which the company had incurred approximately C$150M as of the end of May 2023. The company’s cash balance at the end of May 2023 totaled approximately C$47M.
Overall project construction as of 31 May 2023, stands at approximately 20% complete.
The wholly-owned Blackwater mine is 160km southwest of Prince George, B.C., and is one of the largest capital investments in the region over the last 10 years. Artemis Gold intends to commission an optimization engineering study to formally outline the benefits of the installation of the additional equipment and to confirm the benefits of advancing the Phase 2 expansion earlier than contemplated in the September 2021 Feasibility Study. The results of this study are expected to be released in Q4 2023 and the first gold pour is planned for H2 2024.
For further information, please visit: www.artemisgoldinc.com
