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14 E&MJ; • JULY 2014 www.e-mj.com REGIONAL NEWS - LATIN AMERICA Santo Domingo Project Study Predicts $1.7B Cost, 18-year Life Capstone Mining has released the results of a positive feasibility study of the proposed $1.7 billion Santo Domingo iron oxide-cop- per-gold project in Chile's Region III. The project is owned 70% by Capstone and 30% by Korea Resources Corp. (KORES). The feasibility study forecasts that cop- per production at Santo Domingo will aver- age 248 million lb/y during the first five years of full operation. Average life-of-mine production is forecast at 128 million lb/y of copper in concentrate, 4.2 million mt/y of iron concentrate, and 16,000 oz/y of gold in the copper concentrate. Mine life is pro- jected at 18 years, with operations expect- ed to begin two years after a final con- struction decision. KORES has committed to off-take agreements at market pricing for 50% of production of copper and iron concentrates. The Santo Domingo project will include two open-pit mines using conventional drilling, blasting, loading with diesel hy- draulic shovels, and truck haulage. A con- centrator will be designed to process a nominal 65,000 metric tons per day (mt/d), reducing to 60,000 mt/d in the lat- ter years as the ore becomes slightly hard- er. The concentrator will incorporate SAG and ball milling and conventional flotation utilizing seawater to produce a copper con- centrate. Magnetite iron will be recovered from the copper rougher tailings using low intensity magnetic separation. Infrastructure for the project will include a tailings storage facility, an iron concentrate pipeline, a seawater supply pipeline, a magnetite iron concentrate fil- ter plant and stockpile, and a copper con- centrate storage building at the port, and ship-loading facilities. The Santo Domingo mine and concen- trator will be located 50 km southwest of Codelco's El Salvador copper mine and 130 km north-northeast of Copiapó. The elevation at the site varies between 1,000 and 1,280 m above sea level, with rela- tively gentle topographic relief. Access to the project is 1 km off paved highway C-17 from Diego de Almagro to Copiapó. The magnetite filter plant and stockpile, the copper storage building, and port infra- structure will be located at Punta Roca Blanca, 41 km north of the port city of Caldera. Copper concentrate will be produced at the mine site for trucking to and stockpil- ing at the port. Magnetite concentrate will be thickened on site and then pumped via a con- centrate pipeline to the port. At the port, the magnetite concentrate will be washed, dewatered and stockpiled. Both the copper and magnetite concen- trates will be loaded onto ships for trans- port to third-party smelters. Over the course of the next 10 months, Capstone will focus on advancing Santo Domingo project engineering; working with regulators and communities to obtain approval for the environmental impact statement filed in October 2013 and to secure the required social license; securing a long-term power purchase agreement; developing detailed marketing studies; securing the port concession; developing a robust project execution plan, including assessment and selection of available EPC and EPCM options for the construction of all or portions of the project; and assessing project and corporate financing alternatives. SilverCrest's Santa Elena Mill Nearing Capacity SilverCrest Mines reported in mid-June that commissioning of the new, 3,000- mt/d mill and processing plant at its Santa Elena silver-gold mine in Sonora, Mexico, was on track to achieve design capacity by early August. The new CCD/Merrill Crowe plant is the key element of a three-year program to transition Santa Elena from an open-pit, heap leach operation to under- ground mining. At full production, the plant will produce about 1.5 million oz/y of silver and 32,800 oz/y of gold. The $100 million Santa Elena under- ground transition program included drilling, a pre-feasibility study, detailed engineering, construction of the new pro- cessing plant, and underground develop- ment. FLSmidth, the primary equipment The Santa Elena mill during late-stage construction. (Photo courtesy of SilverCrest Mines) Capstone Mining personnel inspect the company's Santo Domingo copper-gold-iron project in north-central Chile. Photo courtesy of Capstone Mining) (Continued on p. 26) EMJ_pg04-27_EMJ_pg04-27 7/2/14 1:50 PM Page 14