The future looks bright at IAMGOLD’s Côté Gold Project, an open-pit mine development outside Gogama that’s on track to start initial production next month.
The Toronto gold company released an updated mineral estimate on Feb. 15 of its two deposits at Côté that shows there’s more gold to be mined at the open-pit mine development.
Côté is located roughly halfway between Sudbury and Timmins, just off Highway 144.
The company maintains Côté is Canada’s soon-to-be third largest gold mine.
Construction is almost at an end with first gold production beginning in March. The Côté operation will gradually begin the ramp-up toward full commercial production sometime this summer.
The Côté project's two deposits — dubbed Côté and Gosselin — stand to get a whole lot bigger based on the results of last year’s exploration drilling program.
The measured and indicated resources at the Côté deposit jumped 18 per cent (by 1.9 million ounces) to 12.1 million ounces at an average grade of 0.84 grams per tonne. Inferred resources dropped 69 per cent to 1.2 million ounces as a result of converting inferred resources to indicated through drilling.
The difference between measured, indicated and inferred resources is the degree of confidence in the amount of minerals in the ground with measured being the highest and inferred being the lowest.
Côté is the first deposit in the queue to be mined but, down the road, the Gosselin deposit is shaping up to be just as big.
The estimate for Gosselin shows 4.4 million ounces of indicated gold within 161.3 million tonnes at an average grade of 0.85 grams per tonne. The inferred ounces sit at 3.0 million ounces at 123.9 million tonnes at 0.75 grams per tonne.
It’s an increase of 1.1 million ounces in the indicated category and 1.3 million ounces inferred, representing a 32 per cent and a 74 per cent increase, respectively.
In total, the combined Côté and Gosselin deposits shows a total indicated resource estimate of 16.5 million ounces with another 4.2 million ounces in the inferred category.
In a news release, the company said the drilling data suggests the Gosselin deposit has the potential to be as big as the adjacent Côté deposit.
Drill hits from the newly discovered West Breccia shows an ore body measuring 250 metres by 170 metres, down to a depth of 400 metres. The company said there’s potential to expand Gosselin down a “highly prospective corridor” between this West Breccia and the Côté deposit, the latter which is now being mined, down to depth of 600 metres.
IAMGOLD has earmarked $5 million to continue drilling at Gosselin and look for connecting gold extensions between the two pits.
Preliminary mining at Côté really began during the construction phase of digging out the pit. The mineralized ore has been stockpiled for the upcoming start of processing plant.
In a statement, IAMGOLD president-CEO Renaud Adams called the new resource at Gosselin “very exciting, as the value of this deposit to the Côté project is clear.
“Gosselin is a large-scale deposit sitting immediately adjacent to Côté, that when combined have an estimated measured and indicated mineral resource of 16.5 million ounces with an additional 4.2 million ounces of Inferred, putting the project in exclusive company of large-scale Canadian assets.”
