{kanada_flagge}Impressive drill results with good gold grades on long intercepts are only half the battle. Equally important to ecomic success is an easy, as complete as possible gold recovery during subsequent processing. Sitka Gold Corp (CSE:SIG; FRA:1RF; OTCQB:SITKF) has had ore tested for the first time from the Blackjack and Eiger zones of its RC Gold Project in the Yukon. Very good results were obtained right off the bat. In particular, the ore was shown to be non-refractory. Refractory ore is inherently resistant to recovery by standard methods such as cyanidation and carbon adsorption. Instead, gold recovery for Blackjack and Eiger shows strong and rapid leaching kinetics. Gold extraction was mostly complete within 4-8 hours, with minor increases to 24 hours. Gold recoveries at final extraction averaged 85% and reached as high as 94%. Test work was carried out by ALS Canada Ltd. metallurgical services in Kamloops, British Columbia.
Cor Coe, P.Geo., CEO and Director of Sitka Gold, states, “We are very pleased with these excellent metallurgical test results which demonstrate that the gold mineralization of these two zones is non-refractory and has high gold recovery with minimal NaCN consumption. This is significant in that it confirms the potential for an open pit, heap leach, high gold recovery operation; which is typically the most economically efficient method of recovering gold from a deposit. We are rapidly expanding the known mineralization at the Blackjack Zone as we continue to move aggressively from our initial discovery hole.”
Figure 1: McKinsey compares the three types of gold recovery. The most capital-efficient type is heap leaching. Processing refractory ore is the most expensive.
Figure 2: According to McKinsey, the proportion of refractory gold projects is increasing globally, even though they have higher operating costs.
2022 Drilling Program Update
The Company is currently conducting intensive drilling at RC Gold with a focus on further defining gold mineralization laterally and vertically from the 2021 discovery drill hole (Hole 21), which returned 220.1 meters of 1.17 g/t gold, including 50.5 meters of 2.08 g/t gold (see December 13, 2021 news release). So far this year, 13 holes totaling 3,842 metres have been drilled at the Blackjack Zone. Nine holes from the current drilling campaign have been logged, sampled and shipped to ALS Global Labs in Whitehorse, Yukon for analysis.
About the RC Gold Project
The RC Gold Project covers a 376 square kilometer license. It is strategically located midway between Victoria Gold’s Eagle Gold Mine – Yukon’s newest gold mine, which reached commercial production in the summer of 2020 – and Sabre Gold Mine’s Brewery Creek Gold Mine. The RC Gold Project also shares a boundary with Victoria Gold’s Clear Creek property on its western boundary and Florin Resources’ Florin Gold property on its northern boundary. RC Gold is the largest consolidated land package in the region.
This year’s drill program is focused on a large, 500m by 2000m intrusion-related gold system spanning the Blackjack, Saddle and Eiger zones. To date, Sitka has drilled 34 diamond drill holes there with 100% success rates.
Conclusion: By releasing initial metallurgical test results, Sitka Gold allays the concerns of one or two institutional investors who may have been concerned that the good drill results could be due to refractory ore. In terms of investability, Sitka Gold should climb a small rung. For many observers, however, the good metallurgy should not really have come as a surprise, because the neighbor Victoria Gold also benefits from a good gold extraction in its mining operations.
Disclaimer: GOLDINVEST Consulting GmbH publishes comments, analyses and news at https://goldinvest.de. These contents serve exclusively the information of the readers and do not represent any kind of call to action, neither explicitly nor implicitly they are to be understood as an assurance of possible price developments. Furthermore, they do not in any way replace individual expert investment advice and do not constitute an offer to sell the stock(s) discussed or a solicitation to buy or sell securities. This is expressly not a financial analysis, but an advertising / journalistic text. Readers who make investment decisions or carry out transactions on the basis of the information provided here do so entirely at their own risk. There is no contractual relationship between the GOLDINVEST Consulting GmbH and its readers or the users of its offers, because our information refers only to the company, but not to the investment decision of the reader.
The acquisition of securities involves high risks, which can lead to a total loss of the invested capital. The information published by GOLDINVEST Consulting GmbH and its authors is based on careful research. Nevertheless, any liability for financial losses or the content guarantee for topicality, correctness, adequacy and completeness of the articles offered here is expressly excluded. Please also note our terms of use.
According to §34b WpHG and § 48f Abs. 5 BörseG (Austria) we would like to point out that GOLDINVEST Consulting GmbH and/or partners, principals or employees of GOLDINVEST Consulting GmbH hold shares of Sitka Gold and therefore a conflict of interest exists. GOLDINVEST Consulting GmbH also reserves the right to buy or sell shares of the company at any time. Furthermore, GOLDINVEST Consulting GmbH is remunerated by Sitka Gold for reporting on the company. This is another clear conflict of interest.
