Moneta Gold is sitting on an 11.7-million-ounce gold resource at its Tower Gold Project in the Matheson area, 100 kilometres east of Timmins.
The Toronto mine developer’s consultants delivered a new resource estimate showing a 70 per cent bump in gold in the inferred category, a jump of almost 3.1 million ounces, to almost 7.5 million ounces. In the indicated category, there was a smaller eight per cent increase, to 4,265,000 ounces.
Indicated and inferred resources have to do with the degree of confidence in a mineral resource with indicated being of higher confidence and inferred being lower.
Moneta flags the Tower Gold Project as one of North America’s largest undeveloped gold project, capable of “regional scale potential” in the Timmins gold camp.
The company's land holdings of 26,600 hectares is located along Highway 101. It's in the vicinity of some former gold mines situated along the Destor-Porcupine Fault, a well-known gold-bearing geological formation.
The new estimate is drawn from the results of a 72,500-metre drilling program that finished in December.
The company said this new calculation will be the backbone for a mine plan that encompasses a large open-pit operation with the option to go underground chasing higher grade gold.
Come late June, Moneta will provide more details on what the mine could look like when a preliminary economic assessment will be released.
For Moneta CEO Gary O’Connor, this is mission accomplished.
“The objective of a significant increase in mineral resources was achieved, while confirming once more the potential of this exceptional project. We have seen an increase in the underground grade and an expansion of our open pit resource base without any material loss in grade, whilst capturing some of the previous underground resources within the new open pits.”
Another drill program of 70,000 metres is underway. This campaign involves some infill drilling of the deposit, to fill in any gaps and better confirm the gold resource, as well as some step-out drilling to test some promising new exploration targets elsewhere on the property.
Moneta expects to release a pre-feasibility study for Tower Gold sometime in 2023. That scope of work will incorporate more drilling results; a bunch of studies involving mine planning, metallurgical recovery, process design and hydrology; along with environmental baseline and community engagement work.
