The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
Jonathon Naylor Editor The company building a plant to recover gold from mine waste in Snow Lake wants to patent another potentially lucrative invention. BacTech Environ-mental Corp. has applied to patent a new invention it says would allow mines to produce ferric sulfate on site. Ferric sulfate is a valuable chemical, used to treat water for human consumption. In mining, it is used as a leaching lixiviant in processes treating copper concentrates and uranium ores, and as a reagent to control arsenic in metal mining pollution. BacTech said the patent application covers the use of bioleaching as a means of manufacturing liquid ferric sulfate. With the invention, mine tailings at existing operations can be 'refloated' to provide a cheap source of material for the creation of ferric sulfate, the company said. Eliminate cost The invention would save mines money by eliminating the cost of having to transport ferric sulfate, BacTech said. The company plans to open in Snow Lake a bioleaching plant that will neutralize mine waste while extracting from it gold that was not originally recovered. BacTech said its new invention stems from that process, giving the Toronto-based company a new source of potential revenue. 'We have always looked at projects with the idea of extracting metal as our compensation,' said CEO Ross Orr in a news release. 'Here we actually don't need associated metals, as we are making a new product with wide-ranging commercial application by separating the iron from the pyrite through bioleaching. The simplicity is really what makes this interesting from a business point of view.' Orr said most of the research and development associated with the invention is complete, 'so moving to a commercial state will be relatively quick and inexpensive.' The Canadian National Stock Exchange has not reviewed and does not accept responsibility for the adequacy or the accuracy of information supplied by BacTech.
