Modern Mining May 2023

transition to new forms of low-carbon energy. Finding new deposits is costly and, because the mine development cycle can take up to several decades, requires local buy-in for the long term. Luckily, our future is not restricted by exploration. An even better option is maximising the deposits that are cur rently in production by making previously uneconomic resources viable. In fact, this is the ideal situation as mines will already have a defined resource/ reserve base, the necessary permits and infrastructure required to access and process the ore (including haul roads, conveyer belts, mills and housing), experienced work force and, importantly, the support of local residents and governments.

Draslovka has the key to accessing mineral wealth that has already been identified through our cutting edge proprietary Glycine Leaching Technology (GLT) – GlyCat TM for gold and GlyLeach TM for copper, nickel and cobalt. GLT is a safe, simple and cost-effective way to give a new lease of life to assets with minimal invest ment, little to no impact on opex and low production implementation risk. I foresee GLT saving mining companies billions of dollars in the long term. GLT also supports companies’ environmental and social objectives as using fewer chemicals and reagents leads to an improved environmental foot print and stronger relationships with communities, NGOs and other stakeholders. GLT was first piloted at a small African mine where gold and copper were recovered from histori cal mine tailings. Today, some of the world’s largest mining companies are piloting and implementing the technology to improve the value and sustainability of their assets. The GlyCat process is a simple and effective method to reduce cyanide consumption caused by the presence of copper in gold ores and concen trates while also increasing recovery benefits. Gold ores with elevated base metals or pyrites benefit from a >70% reduction in cyanide while most free milling gold ores see a reduction of 20% - 50% in cyanide use, leading to a substantial reduction in processing costs. Moreover, by eliminating detoxifi cation, companies can save an addition 5% - 10% in processing costs. With copper, GlyLeach significantly improves the economics and unlocks new production poten tial from previously unviable deposits through an environmentally benign lixiviant. It is a superior solution for stranded copper oxide deposits, where distance from acid supply sources renders cost of acid uneconomical; carbonate-hosted depos its, where carbonate/limestone deposits are high

acid consumers rendering them uneconomic; and, with oxides with precious and base metal credits, GlyLeach enables co-leaching of other metals con currently. With approximately 30% of the world’s copper coming from heap leaching oxides and increasing demand due to the energy transition, Draslovka sees a massive market need. With nickel and cobalt, two metals critical to bat tery production, GlyLeach offers a disruptive and environmentally friendly solution that is cost effec tive, enables production from tailings, and removes the need for smelting. In addition to high recoveries, GlyLeach leads to very low dissolutions of iron and magnesium, making it a clean pregnant liquor solution that produces a high-purity product for a nickel and cobalt sulphate

6 m columns fully loaded and used to confirm heap leach parameters.

Mini-columns used to do initial discovery tests for heap leach amenability.

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