Modern Mining July 2019

GOLD

d’Ivoire government. Since the first gold was poured in 1991, the mine has been in near-continuous operation and has produced more than 1,2 Moz. The mine has been within the Endeavour port- folio since 2015. It is located 600 km by a paved highway north-west of the capital Abidjan and, with an all- weather airstrip with runway lighting, is easily accessed by air on a 24/7 basis. Once Endeavour took over the mine, it launched a vigor- ous exploration programme designed to increase the resource and reserve base.

increase in throughput, include lower process- ing costs, higher recovery rates on oxide ore, and the ability to process different ore types. The ramp-up of the new plant to full name- plate capacity of 4 Mt/a took less than two months – an astonishing achievement, given that this takes an average of 10 quarters for typical mines – and the plant is currently processing ore at a rate of 11 100 tonnes per day. The gold recovery rate is running at 94 %

This was spectacularly successful, allowing reserves to grow from 0,8 Moz in 2014 to the current 3 Moz (at 1,6 g/t). The exploration suc- cess generated the potential to replace the heap leach operation and, after completing a feasi- bility study in 2016 (which was subsequently optimised), Endeavour launched the CIL proj- ect in September 2017. Advantages of the CIL operation over the heap leach, apart from the more than fourfold

The 29 MW genset-based backup power station.

The Bakatouo pit, one of three current active pits at Ity.

July 2019  MODERN MINING  23