Canadian gold miner Dundee Precious Metals (DPM) has started commercial production from the Krumovgrad gold mine in Bulgaria, which has been renamed as Ada Tepe.
DPM said that the forecast capital cost for the Ada Tepe gold mine will continue to be at C$164-166m (£97.58-98.77m). The original estimate to develop the mine was C$178m (£105.91m).
The company said that construction of the project was nearly 100% complete as of 31 May 2019 and it expects gold contained in concentrate at the Ada Tepe mine to be in the range of 55,000-75,000 ounces in 2019.
Ada Tepe gold mine details
The Ada Tepe gold mine is located nearly 3km south of Krumovgrad in south eastern Bulgaria. As per the project plan, DPM has undertaken construction of an open pit mining operation, consisting of a process plant, which will use conventional crushing, grinding and flotation processing for extraction of gold.
The Bulgarian gold project also features an integrated mine waste facility (IMWF) for the disposal of thickened tailings along with mine rock waste.
DPM had achieved first concentrate production from the Ada Tepe gold mine in March 2019. The Canadian miner said that commercial production has crossed an average of 60% of design throughput capacity and recovery over 30 consecutive days.
During the period, the process plant showed that it can achieve almost 100% of throughput design capacity, said DPM. The company further said that this month, recoveries at the gold project continued to ramp-up beyond the threshold level of commercial production.
The process plant at the Ada Tepe gold mine has a capacity to treat up to 840,000 tonnes of ore per annum through an eight-year mine life.
DPM revealed that ramp-up of the plant to full design capacity is going on and is likely to occur in the third quarter of this year.
DPM president and CEO Rick Howes said: “Commercial production at Ada Tepe marks the beginning of a new chapter for DPM, delivering significant growth in gold production and free cash flow.
“I would like to congratulate all of our employees for achieving this key milestone safely and under budget as well as our local stakeholders for their many years of cooperation and support for this project.”
