Tag Archives: leaching

Arizona Sonoran Copper hires Ausenco for Cactus and Parks/Salyer project PFS

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Arizona Sonoran Copper Company says it has engaged Ausenco as lead engineer to deliver an integrated prefeasibility study (PFS) at the Cactus and Parks/Salyer project, in Arizona, USA, by early 2024.

The project, on private land, is a brownfields site with in-place infrastructure and is accessible via highway.

Additionally, the company is pleased to announce the appointment of Victor Moraila as Chief Engineer, joining as the company transitions into a US-based copper developer.

Ausenco will initially review the Cactus draft PFS and incorporate into the new re-scoped PFS, which includes Parks/Salyer. The study will explore a simple heap leach operation, targeting a potential of 50,000 tons (45,359 t) per annum of LME Grade A Copper Cathode from an on-site solvent extraction/electrowinning (SX/EW) plant.

Mineralised material will be sourced from four deposits initially, including Stockpile, Cactus East, Parks/Salyer and Cactus West.

Pending a successful metallurgical program with Rio Tinto’s Nuton Technologies, and a subsequent commercial agreement, the company and Ausenco will layer in the primary sulphides as a fifth source of mineralised material for the SX-EW plant.

Back in July, Arizona Sonoran announced it had entered into a one-year exclusivity period with Nuton™, a Rio Tinto Venture that, at its core, is a portfolio of proprietary copper leach related technologies and capability. The sulphide potential is not included in the 2021 Cactus preliminary economic assessment, which contemplated a simple heap leach and SX-EW operation over an 18-year mine life, producing an average of 28,000 t/y of LME Grade A copper cathode.

In addition to its own technical staff, Ausenco will lead a technical consultant team comprised of Samuel Engineering, AGP Mining Consultants, Stantec, MineFill Services, Clear Creek Associates and Call & Nicholas Inc.

As part of the PFS work for the project, the company and Ausenco have agreed to complete trade-off and optimisation studies and detailed mine production scenario analysis, in conjunction with AGP Mining, around the following areas:

  • Mineralised material sources from an open-pit expansion (Cactus West), underground development (Cactus East and Parks/Salyer), and the existing stockpile;
  • Ore handling, storage, and agglomeration;
  • Leach pad design and operation;
  • Acid storage, consumption and handling;
  • Solvent extraction and electro-winning;
  • Existing and new infrastructure (as required);
  • Preliminary design of access roads in coordination with mine access roads;
  • Preliminary design and location of mine support facilities; and
  • Mine and geotechnical design.

A PFS detailing the oxide and enriched mineralised material is projected to take approximately 10 months to complete, with results currently expected in the December quarter of 2023. Based on the results of current metallurgical testing with Nuton, layering in the primary sulphide material into the mine plan would extend delivery into early 2024.

George Ogilvie, ASCU President and CEO, said: “As Arizona Sonoran Copper Company emerges as a mid-tier copper developer, we are thrilled to welcome the depth of experiences of both Victor and Ausenco; each rooted in quality and value-driven projects. Looking forward, Arizona Sonoran Copper Company is bolstering the technical services team, necessary team to deliver domestically produced copper into the US copper supply chain, from the third largest independent copper deposit in the US.”

Jetti Resources to deploy catalytic leaching tech at Freeport-operated El Abra

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Jetti Resources has reached an agreement with Sociedad Contractual Minera El Abra and Freeport-McMoRan to deploy Jetti’s leaching technology at the El Abra copper mine in Chile, majority-owned and operated by Freeport.

The use of Jetti’s technology will enable El Abra to produce more copper while taking advantage of existing infrastructure and will generate strong financial returns, according to Jetti.

This is not the first Freeport installation for Jetti, with a spokesperson for the mining company recently confirming to IM it was trialling the technology through “a commercial installation” at its Bagdad mine in Arizona, USA.

Jetti’s catalytic technology will be deployed on the existing leach stockpiles at El Abra and will target over 20 MIb/y (9,072 t/y) of incremental copper cathode production after an initial ramp-up period. The project will leverage existing El Abra infrastructure including excess tankhouse capacity sufficient to process all production from Jetti’s leaching technology. Engineering work for the establishment of Jetti’s on-site catalyst facility is already well advanced, with construction expected to commence in the first half of 2023 and commissioning expected in the second half of the year, Jetti said.

El Abra is an open-pit copper mining complex with a large sulphide resource as well as an established leaching operation. In 2022, El Abra produced approximately 200 MIb of copper.

Mike Outwin, CEO and Co-Founder of Jetti Resources, said: “El Abra is Jetti’s first deployment in Chile, and we are delighted to extend our partnership with Freeport to a second site. Real momentum is building behind the deployment of Jetti’s technology as its unique technological, commercial and environmental benefits become increasingly clear. We look forward to working with Freeport to successfully unlock profitable new pounds of copper with a low carbon footprint and with reduced water consumption.”

Freeport furthers its leading copper leaching excellence

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Among the new applications, technologies and data analytics Freeport-McMoRan is advancing as part of a plan to improve copper recovery from its leach processes in North and South America is Jetti Resources’ patented catalytic technology, the company has confirmed to IM.

In its December quarter and 2022 annual results, released late last month, the leading copper miner said it believed the leach innovation initiatives it was pursuing provided potential opportunities to produce incremental copper from its large existing leach stockpiles and lower-grade material currently classified as waste.

The company has been exploring the potential for incremental low-cost additions to its production and reserve profile for some time, saying in the latest results release that it had identified opportunities to achieve an annual run rate of 200 MIb/y (90,718 t/y) of copper through these initiatives by the end of 2023.

Freeport has a long history of copper leaching production with its Americas division, which includes assets such as Morenci and Cerro Verde, having developed and implemented industry-leading technologies for leaching of oxide ores.

The company has been pursuing internal and external initiatives to expand this leading position, focusing on traditional ores and sulphide orebodies that have been typically considered difficult to leach, like chalcopyrite.

This is where Jetti’s technology comes in.

The Colorado-based company has developed catalytic technology to allow for the efficient and effective heap and stockpile leach extraction of copper. This bolts onto existing solvent extraction/electrowinning (SX/EW) leaching plants so it can be deployed rapidly with limited capital expenditure and, because it uses no heating or grinding, has low operational costs. In addition, there are huge environmental benefits from using leaching over pyrometallurgy, according to Jetti.

A Freeport spokesperson confirmed to IM that the company was in a trial of the Jetti technology through “a commercial installation” at its Bagdad mine in Arizona, USA. This mine is one of its major leaching test hubs, with the company targeting over 3 MIb/y of incremental copper cathode production from the open-pit copper mine through this work.

Bagdad has a 77,100 t/d concentrator that produces copper and molybdenum concentrate, an SX/EW plant that can produce approximately 6 MIb/y of copper cathode from solution generated by low-grade stockpile leaching, and a pressure-leach plant to process molybdenum concentrate.

The spokesperson added: “There is potential to expand production via the treatment of additional stockpiles at Bagdad in the future based on results.”

The use of Jetti’s technology is one of several leaching initiatives the company is pursuing – some with outside vendors, some using its own technology and some with joint venture partners.

All of these are focused on not only adding low-cost production to Freeport’s large production base, but also achieving a lower carbon footprint.

Jetti, which Freeport is an investor in, has been conducting a carbon footprint study and Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of its technology, with the LCA including analyses of typical copper mining operations without Jetti’s technology and a mining operation with Jetti’s technology installed. The LCA is being conducted in conformance with the ISO 14040/44 standard and will be critically reviewed by an independent expert.

Jetti Resources has developed catalytic technology to allow for the efficient and effective heap and stockpile leach extraction of copper

Jetti has also committed to starting to track water usage and waste at all its operations and sites, which includes the installation it has at Capstone Copper’s Pinto Valley operation, also in Arizona.

At Capstone’s operation, Jetti technology is being used extensively as part of a plan to recover up to 350 MIb of cathode copper over the next two decades from historic and new mineralised waste piles.

Teck Resources has also taken an interest in Jetti’s technology having signed an agreement for the evaluation of the solution at a number of Teck’s assets with potential copper resources outside of existing mine plans. BHP, through its BHP Ventures arm, is also an investor in Jetti.

As to Freeport’s wider leaching plans, it said it was looking to use data analytics to provide new insights to drive additional value, while new applications to retain the heat in the stockpiles were “yielding results”.

The company has assessed that it has some 38,000 MIb of contained copper in leach stockpiles deemed “unrecoverable” by traditional leach methods. Of this amount, about 50% is from the massive Morenci mine, which already has leaching production capacity of 900 MIb/y of copper.

Draslovka to bring glycine leaching expertise to OZ Minerals TAD incubator

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Draslovka Holding a.s., a Czech family-owned global leader in cyanide-based specialty chemicals, says its glycine leaching technology has been selected to be part of the OZ Minerals’ Think & Act Differently (TAD) incubator and Waste-to-Value Challenge.

The latter challenge, announced back in December, sees Rio Tinto and Boliden working in collaboration with OZ Minerals to eliminate, minimise, reuse or find new value in mine tailings and ultimately reduce the global carbon footprint of the mining industry. Draslovka said: “The Waste-to-Value Challenge aims to unlock innovative technologies for managing tailings, helping the mining industry to reduce risk while extracting more of the materials the world needs from what was previously regarded as waste for the energy transition at large. Benefits that the initiative hopes to deliver include lower emissions and reduced waste.”

Draslovka offers a range of sustainable solutions to the global mining industry, and its glycine leaching technology (branded as its GlyLeach™ and GlyCat™ processes) represents the best environmentally-friendly alternative to traditional acid and cyanide leaching, according to the company. Due to its selectivity over gangue minerals and the recyclability of glycine, its use enables the recovery of both base and precious metals from lower-grade resources like tailings. This leads to a more sustainable production process and improved economics that are desperately needed to close the looming critical metal supply deficit.

Ivor Bryan, Draslovka’s Mining Innovation Director, said: “I am proud that Draslovka has been invited to participate in the Waste-to-Value Challenge with forward looking companies that understand the need to reimagine solutions for the mining industry. This aligns with our ambition to become the leading supplier for innovative and sustainable solutions for the wider mining industry.”

Speaking to IM on the sidelines of the recent Resourcing Tomorrow conference, in London, Bryan said the company was embarking on around 10 projects in the mining space, which will prove up the 3,500 hours of testing that has been conducted at MPS’ facilities in Perth, Western Australia.

Excelsior Mining to explore Nuton leaching options at Johnson Camp mine

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Excelsior Mining says it has entered into a collaboration agreement with Nuton LLC, a Rio Tinto venture, to evaluate the use of its Nuton copper heap leaching technologies at Excelsior’s Johnson Camp mine in Cochise County, Arizona, USA.

Rio Tinto has developed the Nuton technologies, an extensive portfolio of advanced copper heap leaching technologies targeted at primary sulphde minerals (including lower-grade minerals), which could not otherwise be processed using traditional leaching or sulphide processing technologies. These technologies offer the potential to produce additional copper in a cost-effective manner that has significant environmental benefits and reduces waste from new and ongoing operations.

The agreement with Excelsior adds to similar pacts Nuton has signed with Regulus Resources, McEwen Copper, Lion Copper and Gold Corp and Arizona Sonoran Copper Company.

The first stage of the collaboration involves Nuton completing certain test work on materials collected from the company’s Johnson Camp mine project to confirm that suitable conditions exist to deploy the Nuton technologies. Assuming this test work is successful, the parties would then work toward negotiating commercial terms for a full-scale deployment of the Nuton technologies at the Johnson Camp mine.

Test work is expected to commence during the March quarter of 2023 with a view toward potentially negotiating commercial terms dependent on the test results and other factors during the September quarter of 2023.

Excelsior is a mineral exploration and production company that owns and operates the Gunnison copper project in Cochise County, Arizona. The project is an in-situ recovery copper extraction project permitted to 125 million pounds (56,699 t) per year of copper cathode production. Excelsior also owns the past producing Johnson Camp Mine and a portfolio of exploration projects, including the Peabody Sill and the Strong and Harris deposits.

Rio’s Nuton venture eyes up leaching opportunities at Regulus’ AntaKori project

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Regulus Resources Inc has announced a $15 million non-brokered private placement by Nuton, which will see the Rio Tinto Venture take an approximate 16.5% interest in the company and jointly undertake copper sulphide leach testing using Nuton’s copper sulphide leach technologies with samples from the AntaKori project in Peru.

The Nuton™ technologies, Rio says, have the potential to process arsenic-bearing copper sulphides with less impact on the environment and water resources than traditional concentrator processing.

Regulus has granted exclusivity to Nuton in the area of novel, patented or trade secret leaching technologies, for a period of one year after the delivery of metallurgical samples from AntaKori to Nuton for testing.

Rio, through its Nuton venture, has tabled a solution to treat primary copper sulphides such as chalcopyrite. At its centre is a portfolio of proprietary copper leach related technologies and capability that, Nuton says, offer the potential to economically unlock known low-grade copper sulphide resources, copper bearing waste and tailings, and achieve higher copper recoveries on oxide and transitional material. This allows for a significantly increased copper production outcome, according to the company.

Regulus Resources has outlined a 250 Mt at 0.48% Cu, 0.29 g/t Au and 7.5 g/t Ag indicated resource at AntaKori, in addition to a 267 Mt at 0.41% Cu, 0.26 g/t Au and 7.8 g/t Ag inferred resource.

John Black, Chief Executive Officer of Regulus, said: “The investment by Rio Tinto, one of the largest miners in the world, is another strong endorsement for the AntaKori project. Through Nuton, Rio Tinto has developed sulphide leach processing technologies that could allow for the processing of high arsenic ores without the need for additional on-site treatment or paying heavy penalties to a smelter. Utilising the Nuton sulphide leach technologies could truly be a gamechanger for the AntaKori deposit. The private placement will significantly bolster our financial position and enhance our ability to optimise the value of the existing resources in the project area.”

Rio Tinto’s Chief Executive, Copper, Bold Baatar, added: “This agreement will allow us to evaluate the potential to commercially deploy Rio Tinto’s innovative Nuton technologies for copper leaching at Regulus’ AntaKori project. Our Nuton technologies have the capacity to increase copper production for Rio Tinto and our partners, with a lower carbon footprint and leading environmental performance. Unlocking value from high-arsenic copper sulphides is a particularly exciting prospect for Nuton.”

Draslovka about to move into glycine leaching mining demonstration phase

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Czech Republic-based Draslovka Holding is heading into a busy 12-month period where its glycine leaching technology will be showcased at numerous mining projects across the globe, the company told IM on the side lines of the Resourcing Tomorrow conference, in London, this week.

According to Ivor Bryan, Director of Mining Innovation at Draslovka Mining Solutions and the former MD of Mining & Process Solutions (MPS), the entity responsible for the development of the GlyCat™ and GlyLeach™ technologies, the company is embarking on around 10 projects in the mining space, which will prove up the 3,500 hours of testing that has been conducted at MPS’ facilities in Perth, Western Australia.

MPS was acquired by Draslovka, a major sodium cyanide producer in 2022, with the aim of the transaction being to grow and develop the glycine leaching business.

Gold leach testing via GlyCat has been the major area of focus over the last decade. The process was invented to reduce cyanide consumption while maintaining gold recovery for gold ores from deposits containing nuisance copper. It has been designed to enhance the dissolution of gold and copper in gold/copper ores where glycine is used as a catalyst with cyanide in a cyanide-starved leaching environment. It doesn’t replace cyanide, but, in fact, enhances its leaching capabilities by dealing with the high-cyanide consuming copper within these gold-copper orebodies.

Yet, the company is also now starting to make inroads into the base metal space through GlyLeach, with nickel and cobalt two specific areas of interest. The technology is able to leach the targeted metals with enhanced selectivity compared with conventional methods. It will solubilise copper, nickel, cobalt and zinc, while gangue minerals such as iron, manganese, silicates and carbonates remain in the leach residue, Draslovka says.

This is allowing the company to promote that it can reduce the capital expenditure associated with processing these metals by removing the need for smelting, or in the case of tailings deposits, helping recover metal from assets previously written off as ‘waste’.

While the technology could have applications at run of mine operations, Bryan and his colleague Jackson Briggs, Corporate Development Manager of Draslovka, believe the most immediate opportunity is in tailings where the application of glycine leaching on ‘waste’ material could recover valuable metals while reducing the potential liabilities associated with such storage facilities.

Of the 10 or so projects the company has ahead of it, one is situated in Western Australia where the company is looking to recover nickel and cobalt metals from a tailings deposit of a major mining company.

Another project – much closer to fruition – is in Chile and involves leaching a carbonate-hosted copper oxide deposit containing some 600 t of material.

In both cases, the company is looking to demonstrate that it can recover valuable metals at high recovery rates, with low impact – namely rationalising reagent and water use and, in the case of nickel-cobalt, removing smelting from the equation.

This, according to Draslovka CEO, Pavel Bruzek, is a “win-win” for mining companies and their stakeholders, benefitting both the balance sheet and the operational environmental footprint.

“While we are a major sodium cyanide producer, when we saw the potential of MPS’ glycine leaching technology and the increase in metallurgical complexity of orebodies looking to be exploited, it made perfect sense to work with and promote this technology,” he told IM. “It is the responsible thing to do for the industry.”

Rio Tinto’s Nuton to test leaching tech at McEwen Copper’s Los Azules project

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McEwen Copper’s Los Azules project in Argentina looks like becoming the latest potential leaching asset put under the Nuton® Technologies microscope after the signing of a collaboration agreement between McEwen Copper and Nuton.

The agreement, tied to an oversubscribed $81.85 million offering of McEwen Copper shares, will see Nuton, a Rio Tinto Venture, test its technology for compatibility with Los Azules copper mineralisation.

Nuton, for its part, also contributed $25 million into the funds raised by McEwen Copper.

Rio Tinto’s copper leaching technology venture has been in the headlines of late, signing deals with, among other companies, Arizona Sonoran Copper Company Inc and Lion Copper and Gold, to test out its solutions.

Nuton is aimed at growing Rio Tinto’s copper business. At its core is a portfolio of proprietary copper leach related technologies and capability – a product of almost 30 years of research and development.

Rio says the Nuton technologies offer the potential to economically unlock known low-grade copper sulphide resources, copper bearing waste and tailings, and achieve higher copper recoveries on oxide and transitional material, allowing for a significantly increased copper production outcome, according to Rio. One of the key differentiators of Nuton is the potential to deliver leading environmental performance, including more efficient water usage, lower carbon emissions, and the ability to reclaim mine sites by reprocessing mine waste, Rio claims.

McEwen Copper and Nuton will jointly undertake copper leach testing using Nuton Technologies with samples from Los Azules. McEwen Copper has agreed to grant exclusivity to Nuton for one year in the area of novel, patented or trade secret leaching technology, while it will continue its independent test work and studies using conventional leach technologies.

McEwen Copper Chief Executive, Rob McEwen, said: “We recognise the potential opportunity of using Nuton Technologies to produce copper in greater amounts, more rapidly, and with less impact on the environment and water resources. I trust that our relationship with Nuton and Rio Tinto will accelerate the process of realising the enormous potential of Los Azules.”

Rio Tinto Chief Executive Copper, Bold Baatar said: “This agreement will allow us to evaluate the potential to commercially deploy Rio Tinto’s innovative Nuton Technologies for copper leaching in McEwen Copper’s planned development of Los Azules. Our Nuton Technologies have the capacity to unlock increased copper production for Rio Tinto and our partners, with a low carbon footprint and leading environmental performance.”

The next milestones at Los Azules are the upcoming drilling season from October 2022 to June 2023, the completion of an updated preliminary economic assessment early in the March quarter, and the planned initial public offering of McEwen Copper in the first half of 2023.

Los Azules’ current copper resources are estimated at 10.2 billion pounds (4.6 Mt) at a grade of 0.48% Cu (indicated category) and an additional 19.3 billion pounds (8.8 Mt) at a grade of 0.33% Cu (inferred category).

Orica’s Chemicals business eyes new complementary opportunities

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Orica’s Investor Day, taking place last week, highlighted potential growth areas in one of the company’s less-publicised ‘verticals’, its Chemicals business.

Mining, Quarry & Construction and Digital solutions often steal the headlines in quarterly updates, but Adam Hall, Group Executive & President of Asia & Chemicals, showed there is plenty going on within the company’s fourth vertical.

This business, which covers the fields of ore processing, chemical stabilisation and recovery & treatment, strengthens Orica’s presence across the mining value chain, having a strong alignment with its global footprint and understanding of customer needs, the company says. It also acts as a complementary component of Orica’s “new solutions offerings”.

Orica’s current exposure is to leaching agents and emulsifiers, with cyanide making up its biggest product today.

As one of the largest producers of sodium cyanide for mining, Orica delivers the leaching agent in briquette form in circa-1 tonne boxes that are easily containerised, or within an Orica-designed Sparge isotainer system, or in liquid form via purpose-built iso tanks suitable for safe road or rail transport around the world.

It relies on the Yarwun, Gladstone Cyanide Manufacturing Facility in Queensland for this supply, which has an annual capacity of 95,000 t/y and is compliant with ISO9002 and the International Cyanide Management Code. This facility is complemented by the company’s sodium cyanide transfer stations in Peru, Ghana and Malaysia.

Hall was positive about potential growth opportunities in the cyanide space, explaining demand for cyanide was expected to outpace the predicted growth in gold ore treated to 2026 as the complexities involved with treating orebodies continued to increase.

He said the Yarwun facility had great brownfield growth opportunities around the site, with the company evaluating potential expansions in the region of “high single digit” or “low double digit” percentages.

Hall was equally positive about cyanide retaining its presence in the gold leaching process, saying that, while substitution questions continued to come up, the realities associated with such a transition meant it was infrequently feasible.

“There is one major mine that has switched away from using cyanide into a different reagent,” he said. “That cost them north of $100 million, and our understanding is they would not necessarily do it again. Also, that specific mine has a certain lithography that lent itself to using that reagent.”

Hall said Orica’s emulsifiers – which allow it to differentiate its explosives products through maintaining the stability of the mixture – represented “a small but mighty part” of the company’s product suite. He saw potential growth opportunities for emulsifiers, which he said contained the “secret sauce for emulsification”.

Outside of these two Orica mainstays, Hall highlighted the potential for Orica to play in both flotation and solvent extraction markets as part of growth opportunities that added up to A$23 billion ($16 billion).

In flotation, collectors, frothers and flocculants are integral to optimising the process. The same can be said for solvent extractants in the SX space.

“We see all of these as potentially interesting for Orica,” Hall said. “These are all big fields…but each of them has something we could potentially partner or bring to our clients, and something we will be looking to do over the next five years or so.”

Partnerships could potentially see Orica team up with big chemical players that have a by-product or comparatively small value stream coming out of an integrated facility where Orica could bring its “deep understanding of what the miners need and how we can deliver against that using the products that are produced”, he explained.

This could see Orica act as an agent, an offtaker, or purchaser of the by-product production unit.

As with all other Orica verticals, the Chemicals business will be looking at any potential bolt-on to the emulsifier and cyanide offering as a way to influence more of the value chain, ensuring changes made up- or down-stream provide value throughout the full flowsheet.

Draslovka eyes base metal leaching prize with MPS glycine technology

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Draslovka Holding made its presence felt in the mining chemicals space about a year ago when it announced plans to acquire Chemours Company’s Mining Solutions business, a deal that has since seen it become one of the largest North American producers of solid sodium cyanide.

This acquisition, completed in December for $521 million, also laid the groundwork for a separate transaction that could see the Czech Republic-based company diversify into the in-demand battery metals arena.

Australia-based Mining & Process Solutions (MPS) had been on the Mining Solutions business radar for at least two years prior to the Draslovka transaction, according to James Stockbridge, Director of Draslovka Mining Solutions. Stockbridge, formerly of Chemours and DuPont, said that his team at Draslovka realised MPS had something on its books that could solve many of the challenges the industry was experiencing and transform mining solutions by using an amino acid called glycine.

“For more than a decade now, the industry has recognised that orebodies are becoming lower grade, processing them is becoming more complex and the environmental regulations associated with leaching are becoming stricter,” Stockbridge told IM.

“It is the challenge of our time, and we think MPS has something quite unique to offer here.”

With roots in the gold technology group at the renowned Curtin University in Western Australia, MPS’ glycine leaching technology has the potential to change both the gold and base metal leaching space.

In gold, MPS’ GlyCat™ process was invented to reduce cyanide consumption while maintaining gold recovery for gold ores from deposits containing nuisance copper. GlyCat has been designed to enhance the dissolution of gold and copper in gold/copper ores where glycine is used as a catalyst with cyanide in a cyanide-starved leaching environment. It doesn’t replace cyanide, but, in fact, enhances its leaching capabilities by dealing with the high-cyanide consuming copper within these gold-copper orebodies.

In copper, nickel, cobalt and zinc leaching, GlyLeach™ is able to leach the targeted metals with enhanced selectivity compared with conventional methods. It will solubilise copper, nickel, cobalt and zinc, while gangue minerals such as iron, manganese, silicates and carbonates remain in the leach residue, MPS says.

Both technologies are environmentally safe, work effectively at alkaline pHs and ambient temperatures (with no heating cost or pressure vessels) and come with low operating costs due to their low consumption and recovery/recycling traits, according to the company.

While it is the gold side of glycine leaching testing that has, so far, taken the headlines thanks to several trials with mining companies in Australia (including Evolution Mining) and the technology’s potential ability to partially replace cyanide in the leaching process, Stockbridge and his colleague Jackson Briggs (Corporate Development Manager for Draslovka) said Draslovka was most excited about what the technology could offer the base metal space.

Briggs said: “It gives us the opportunity to expand our leadership position in gold leaching agents into base metals. At the same time, it also allows us to incorporate our expertise in that chemistry and chemical manufacturing side of things.”

Stockbridge – not wanting to give away too much – hinted at how this latter opportunity could play out.

“The leaching technology will also influence the way you, for instance, operate, monitor and control the plant,” he said. “This process will be different, and we will be bringing in new technologies to cater to this.”

Considering Draslovka can produce glycine from its existing hydrogen cyanide production footprint, there is potential for a very smooth integration on the supply chain side of things.

Asked to quantify some of the benefits of the technology, Stockbridge was happy to point out GlyLeach’s potential to “simplify the flowsheet” for, say, nickel production, removing the smelting aspect and resultant ore transportation – providing capital and carbon footprint benefits.

Briggs added: “It can change a lot from ore-to-ore with GlyLeach, but, in a really strong business case, you are looking at a 25% reduction in processing costs.”

This is on top of a 10-35% improvement on the recovery side, compared with conventional leaching, Stockbridge said, citing “proof of concept” studies.

As for GlyCat, the sweet spot – as already hinted at – is in gold-copper orebodies where copper is a large cyanide consumer, with the technology allowing cyanide to work more efficiently and effectively.

Both technologies recently featured in OZ Minerals Ingenious Extraction Innovator challenge outcomes publication, while GlyCat has also been the subject of a one-off study looking at combining it with Sixth Wave Innovations’ IXOS® molecular imprinted polymer for gold extraction.

Australia’s Future Battery Industry Cooperative Research Centre, which is sponsored by the likes of Sandfire Resources, Barrick Gold, Coda Minerals (previously Gindalbie Metals) and Poseidon Nickel, is also coordinating some of the work towards commercialising GlyLeach.

There is a strong business case for both technologies first being deployed at scale on tailings deposits that have been deemed to have no associated value – a point both Stockbridge and Briggs acknowledged.

Briggs said: “In terms of accelerating the development of the technologies, there are tailings deposits and waste piles situated all over the globe with high amounts of precious and base metals that have not been extracted due to the limitations and economies associated with current processing technology. We could provide an economic way of extracting those.

“It would also provide us a project with much reduced start-up times compared with, say, a greenfield project.”

Stockbridge added: “We have carried out some work on this type of application before and believe there is the potential to extract 50% of the nickel that they couldn’t access with existing technology by using GlyLeach.”

From the mining company perspective, deploying a new technology on material already written off comes with a lot less risk too.

That is before appreciating that the material won’t have to be smelted on site, that the process produces no free cyanide and that gangue materials do not come out in solution.

It is no wonder the Draslovka duo are excited about the technology’s potential; GlyLeach in particular.

“The ability to help nickel and copper miners produce more metal to rescue some of these deposits that have been forgotten or under-developed because of technology limitations and be able to do so in a way that is more environmentally friendly is exciting.

“Potentially, this technology could help localise more electric vehicle supply chains by removing the need for smelting and providing a cost-effective and environmentally friendly means of extracting metals.

“We cannot wait to get started.”