Apr 17 2019
On April 16th, 2019, Rio2 Limited provided a project update for its Fenix Gold Project situated in the Maricunga region, Chile.
Rio2 has continued to develop the Fenix Gold Project to production and has accomplished many endeavors as scheduled. Currently, Rio2 aims to complete a new version of the Pre-Feasibility Study (PFS), which was carried out by former owners, Atacama Pacific Gold Corporation.
This study will explain how Rio2 has attempted to advance the project. The completion of the Feasibility Study for the project has been put off until the market situations are more productive to support the rest of the activities for completing the Feasibility Study work program.
The current Pre-Feasibility Study, titled “NI 43-101 Technical Report on the Cerro Maricunga Project Pre-Feasibility Study Atacama Region, Chile,” dated October 6th, 2014, with an effective date of August 19th, 2014, can be obtained through SEDAR under Rio2’s SEDAR profile at www.sedar.com. In 2018, Rio2 gave a new name to the Cerro Maricunga Project as the Fenix Gold Project.
The updated PFS will be completed by a professional engineering expert team in Lima, Peru, together with the technical team of Rio2. The engineering consultants, such as HLC Ingeniería y Construcción (metallurgical review, process design, and site layout) and Anddes (civil design and geotechnical review), were involved in the construction and engineering design of the La Arena and Shahuindo gold projects situated in Peru. STRACON, the mining alliance partners of Rio Alto Mining Limited at La Arena and Shahuindo, provided the contract mining and civil construction details of the updated PFS. Mining Plus will be responsible for mine design, pit optimization, and mine scheduling activities and will help in collecting the technical report regarding the updated PFS.
Following the completion of the updated resource estimation, as anticipated, no material changes were found in the overall grade and contained metal upon comparison with the resource model described in the 2014 PFS. The recent 7,000-m drilling aimed at the USD$728 pit shell has verified the higher-grade nature of the material at the surface, restrained by the pit shell.
This higher-grade mineralization will be the focus of the updated PFS and is anticipated to offer an organized way to the development of the Fenix Gold Project. On the basis of a smaller starter project, the updated PFS, in comparison with the 2014 PFS, will help a lower initial capex, higher grades originally being mined, and a lower initial strip ratio.
Together with the completion of the updated PFS, the company completes a water options study aimed at identifying and locating water rights near the Fenix Gold Project for use during the planned starter phase of the project. Discovering water rights near the project will allow Rio2 to promote its development plan and to improve the big long-term water project from Copiapo, a big project planned for Fenix, which will be next to the starter phase.
It is anticipated that the completion of the updated PFS will be before the close of July 2019.
Mr Enrique Garay, MSc P.Geo (AIG Member), Senior Vice President Geology of Rio2, is the Qualified Person (as defined by NI 43-101) capable of governing the company’s exploration programs and disclosure of drilling results. The scientific and technical information in this news release has been read and approved by him.