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FEBRUARY 2018 • E&MJ; 51 www.e-mj.com PROCESSING SOLUTIONS DST said the results of this additional testing are expected to provide eCobalt with feasibility-level-detailed engineer- ing data to assist in costing and sizing of equipment to produce a clean cobalt con- centrate with less than 0.5% arsenic us- ing DST's pyrolysis approach at eCobalt's proposed cobalt production facility. The piloting work will be conducted at DST's facilities in Thetford Mines, Quebec, where previous laboratory work on ICP mineralized material identifi ed that it is amenable to pyrolysis to produce a clean, low arsenic, cobalt concentrate. In 2017, a small-cap Canadian com- pany called Cobaltech Mining (formerly known as Big North Graphite) acquired a fully permitted cobalt plant, situated in Cobalt, Ontario, near a number of cobalt mineral properties. CobalTech said the re- fi nery was fully permitted and production could be expanded to 4,000 mt/d before additional permitting is required. The company also reported in May its intention to acquire a 70% interest in sev- en prospective copper-cobalt properties in Congo, but later in the year decided not to proceed with that transaction. In late November, First Cobalt, a Canadian company formed in 2017, announced a merger with Cobaltech, making Cobaltech a subsidiary of First Cobalt. First Cobalt also acquired Australian company Cobalt One, which gave First Cobalt ownership of mineral properties held by Colbalt One in Ontario's Cobalt mining camp. Trent Mell, president and CEO of First Cobalt, said, "First Cobalt controls 50 historic mining operations across the Co- balt Camp and this program will give us important insights into the geology, met- allurgy and bulk mining potential of the Camp. Success with this program could warrant reactivating the mill and poten- tially the First Cobalt refi nery to produce battery materials." The refi nery, according to First Cobalt, is the only facility of its kind in North Amer- ica with no set limits on processing or stor- ing arsenic from feeds. This is signifi cant given that the Cobalt camp has produced silver-cobalt arsenide ores throughout its history. The other refi neries permitted to treat ores containing arsenic are owned by Vale, Glencore and Sherritt Interna- tional. The refi nery's capabilities include three separate circuits within the complex to process various secondary feeds using pressure acid-leach, solvent extraction, and Merrill-Crowe for precious metals. Primary ore feed would require installation or acquisition of a mill to prepare concen- trate for processing. The company said the refi nery also will require upgrades to meet potential future processing demands. In mid-January 2018, RNC Miner- als said it expects to undertake a series of initiatives during 2018 to position the company to make a decision to begin con- struction of the Dumont nickel-cobalt proj- ect — which the company says contains the world's largest undeveloped reserves of both cobalt and nickel — in 2019. Dumont is a sulfi de deposit rather than a laterite deposit, which allows the recovery of nickel and cobalt using con- ventional milling technology rather than the more technically challenging pressure acid leach (PAL/HPAL) technology. In an unrelated development, Vale Canada's Coleman mine near Sudbury, which produces cobalt as a byproduct of nickel mining, was scheduled to restart operations in February after being shut down in early November due to safety concerns associated with the mine's ven- tilation shaft.