Herencia Resources, the Chile-focussed mineral exploration and development company, has completed a feasibility study for its flagship silver-zinc-lead project in northern Chile, the Paguanta Project.
The company said that the study had found that the initial mine life was eight years and that the time frame would involve three years of mining by open pit followed by a minimum five years of underground mining operations.
The initial project capital cost would be $60m, with Herencia's 70% share being $42m, the company added.
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It said that first mine production was being targeted for 2015 while the feasibility study was described as having identified "excellent potential to expand both production rate and mine life."
Open pit mining would be scheduled at an initial Run of Mine (ROM) production rate of 400,000 tonnes per annum (tpa), at a proposed waste to ore strip ratio of approximately 11.7:1, the group said.
Throughput would increase to 460,000 tonnes per annum (tpa) with the introduction of underground mining in year four.
Graeme Sloan, Managing Director of Herencia Resources, commented: "The Paguanta Feasibility Study has returned first class results and its completion is a major milestone for Herencia. The next step is to progress with the lodgement of the Project permitting application, as a pre-cursor to a development decision for the Project with the goal of commencing production in 2015."
Herencia Resources's share price was up 4.32% to 0.84p at 08:59 on Friday.
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