Mina De Cobre Panama | mine, copper mine

 mine, copper mine

This is the concession area for the Mina De Cobre Panama copper/gold/molybdenum project which was previously 100% owned by Inmet Mining. In September 2008 Inmet acquired Petaquilla Copper Ltd, and in November 2008 acquired Teck Cominco’s share. In October 2009 Inmet announced an option agreement with Korean Panamá Mining Company (KPMC) under which they would have the right to acquire a 20% equity interest in the project. KPMC is a consortium of Korea Resources Corporation and LS-Nikko Copper Incorporated, and they elected to exercise their option for 20% on January 10, 2012.

In April 2013 First Qantum Minerals Limited acquired Inmet then the ownership became First Quantum 80% and LS-Nikko 20%. However on August 31, 2017 First Quantum announced thay had acquired 10% more of LS-Nikko thus the ownership is First Quantum 90% and LS-Nikko 10%. All interests are held in the holding company Minera Panamá S.A. which owns the concession for the mine.

Historically work in the area began with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) who from 1968-1969 conducted regional geological and geochemical surveys and drilled 37 holes in the Botija, Colina, Vega, and Medio areas. In 1969, after UNDP ceased work the government of Panama put the Cobre Concession up for bidding, and subsequently awarded it to Panamá Mineral Resources Development Company (PMRD). PMRD was a Japanese consortium and from 1970 to 1979 drilled over 14,000 meters of holes, established premiiminary reserves and sanctioned a pre-feasibility report, and began negotiations with the Government for terms of production. However, they abandoned the concession in 1980.

From 1990 to 1992 the property was owned by Minnova with 80% and Georecursos International S.A. with 20%. They continued exploration work which included regional lithogeochemical sampling. Adrian Resources limited was granted an option to earn 40% of Minnova’s interest in 1992 through cash payments, work commitment, and commission of a feasibility study. Adrian then acquired Georecurso’s interest to bring its total interest to 52%. Up until 1995 Adrian carried out grid-based soil sampling and magnetic measurements, geologic mapping of selected areas, and drilling of approximately 396 diamond drill holes in Colina, Botija, and exploration targets.

Teck then gained a 26% interest in the project by purchasing half of Adrian's share and agreeing to undertake a feasibility study and provide financing to bring the mine into production. There was limited activity until 2005 when Minera Panamá S.A. entered into the Molejón Gold Agreement in which shareholders transferred rights to any gold deposits on the concession to Petaquilla Minerals Limited for a 5% NSR. Between 2007 and 2008 activity resumed on the copper deposits with the JV drilling condemnation, metallurgical, infill, and pit geotech holes. A Lidar topo survey of concession was also conducted.

In 2008 Inmet acquired Petaquilla Copper Ltd which brought their total interst in Minera Panamá S.A. to 74%, then in that same year bought the 26% of Minera owned by Teck, bringing their ownerhsip in Minera to 100%. Korea Resources Corporation exercised their option to gain a 20% interst in the project in 2012 which led to the ownership before First Quantum acquired Inmet.

The Cobre Panama concession consists of 7 main mineral bearing lithological units called: Botija, Botija Abajo and Brazo which together are referred to as BABR, Medio, Colina, Balboa, and Valle Grande. Each will be mined in sequence starting with Botija Pit in 2017 and ending with Balboa Pit in 2041-2055, which will result in a life of mine around 38 years. Mining will be conducted using conventional open pit methods and all crushing will done within the pit. Trolley assisted haulage will be used where practical.

The process plant has an ultimate capacity of 274,000 t/day of ore at a head grade of 0.65% Cu and 0.023% Mo. Crushed ore is conveyed from the pit to a secondary crusher then to a coarse ore stockpile. Ore will be fed from the stockpile into two parallel wet-grinding lines comprised of semi-autogenous grinding (SAG) mill and two ball mills. A gravity gold plant will be connected to the ball mill circuit where centrifugal gravity concentrators will recover free gold and process it to a final product in a gold plant.

The next step is flotation where the copper, molybdenum, and gold is extracted and concentrated in a rougher followed by cleaner flotation. Primary high grade concentrate from the first rougher is extracted to columns and cleaned to produce a final bulk concentrate. The lower grade material is extracted and re-ground then cleaned in two stages of mechanical cells followed by a one column stage to produce a final bulk concentrate. All Concentrate is thickened conventionally and pumped to a differential flotation plant where copper is sunk, and molybdenite floated into a molybdenum concentrate.

Copper concentrate is thickened then pumped through a 25 km pipeline to the port site at Punta Rincón on the Caribbean Sea where it is filtered, reclaimed, and loaded onto bulk ore carriers for shipment. Molybdenum concentrate is be transported by truck in bulga bags to the port for shipment to overseas roasters. The port has coal receiving and storage facilities to feed a coal fire power plant that includes two 150 MW coal-fired generators that will provide power to the mine via a 230 kV power transmission line. That line will then connect to the national power grid at the Llano Sanchez substation.

Resources and Reserves are calculated based on each pit with a final total for the entire project. As of December 31, 2016 only the Botija deposit had reported proven reserves whereas the others only had probabe reported as exploration work was continuing. Botija had proven reserves of 345.6 Mt grading 0.45% Tcu, 74.88 ppm Mo, 0.10 ppm Au, and 1.33 ppm Ag. Probable reserves were 603.5 Mt grading 0.35% Tcu, 74.88 ppm Mo, 0.10 ppm Au, and 1.10 ppm Ag. Including the probable values from the other pits the reserves are 3,182.5 Mt grading 0.35% Tcu, 59.57 ppm Mo, 0.07 ppm Au, and 1.35 ppm Ag.

The region is underlain by altered andesitic to basaltic flows and tuffs and clastic sedimentary rocks of presumed early to mid-Tertiary age, intruded by the mid-Oligocene Petaquilla batholith which is granodiorite in composition. The deposits are classed as porphyry and lie at the southern margin of a large granodiorite batholith of mid-Oligocene age. The most prevalent copper sulphide associated with mineralisation is chalcopyrite and to a lesser degree bornite. Sulphides typically occur as dissemination, micro-veinlets, fracture fillings and quartz sulphide
stockworks. Molybdenite traces are commonly found in quartz veinlets.

Sources:

First Quantun Cobre Panama Project NI 43-101 Technical Report:
www.sedar.com/search/search_form_pc_en.htm

First Quantum Minerals website:
www.first-quantum.com/Our-Business/Development-Projects...