REGIONAL NEWS - AFRICA
10.3 years. Initial capital costs are estimated at C$609.7 million, and average on-site operating costs are esti- mated at $671/oz. Volta President and CEO Kevin Bullock said, "These are monumental results for Volta that widely exceeded our expectations and place Volta firmly on the path to production. It's notable that the strong economic benefits arise from conservative assumptions and, along with numerous options for opti- mization, we are confident that we can make these numbers even more power- ful. We will continue our aggressive pace toward production. We will contin- ue drilling our new high-grade deposit and conclude various technical tasks in order to begin a feasibility study as soon as possible."
The prefeasibility study is based only on mineral resources in the Kiaka Central area. Drilling undertaken 750 m south of the Kiaka Central area has identified the potential for an open-pit, high-grade satellite resource. Volta is currently drilling this target with a view to defining a maiden mineral resource
estimate early in the third quarter of 2012. The close proximity of this pos- sible high-grade satellite resource may
offer the opportunity to begin produc- tion at a considerably higher grade than is considered in the prefeasibility study.
www.e-mj.com
JUNE 2012 • E&MJ; 39