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 A decision is drawing closer on whether to develop an American mineral deposit that would potentially supply the Flin Flon metallurgical plant with a fresh supply of zinc. Hudbay recently upped its stake to 51 per cent in the Back 40 project, with junior miner Aquila Resources holding the remainder. Hudbay remains the operator. It's part of a new operating agreement between the two companies relative to Back 40, a zinc-copper-gold-silver deposit west of Stephenson, Michigan. In another promising sign, Aquila and Hudbay expect to release a guideline-compliant preliminary economic assessment (PEA) for the project by May 21. The initial project scope will be an open pit design that includes backfilling of the pit once mining has completed. 'The execution of the operating agreement, and completion of the preliminary economic assessment, are the next steps in the progression of the Back 40 project towards making a construction decision,' Thomas Quigley, president and CEO of Aquila, said in a news release. 'The PEA will provide an initial, order of magnitude financial appraisal of an open pit mine plan exploiting only a portion of the identified resource at Back 40, and will also provide parameters and guidance for the upcoming pre-feasibility study.' Hudbay can increase its ownership of Back 40 to 65 per cent following completion of a feasibility study, submission of all mine permit applications and by making payments on outstanding land option agreements. Hudbay would then have the ability to increase its stake by another 10 per cent should Aquila elect not to fund its portion of capital expenditures for development within 90 days of receipt of mining permits. Hudbay confirmed in 2009 that Back 40 could provide a new supply of concentrate for the metallurgical plant. 'This is an excellent opportunity for Hudbay to advance the project towards production, and is a close fit with our strategic plan,' said then-CEO Peter Jones. 'As a significant potential open pit zinc mine, the project may also supply concentrate to our Flin Flon metallurgical plant.' The Back 40 project currently contains a guideline-compliant resource estimate of 17.89 million tonnes grading 1.57 grams of gold per cent, 19.60 grams of silver per tonne, 0.19 per cent copper and 2.44 per cent zinc. Based on that estimate, total contained metals consist of 907,000 ounces of gold, 11.31 million ounces of silver, 963 million pounds zinc, and 75.8 million pounds of copper.
