IS THERE gold in them thar Scottish Hills? There is according to a company called Scotgold Resources, but they are having problems getting mining permits with various environmental groups concerned about the destruction of the landscape through slurry and waste run-off.
The community of Tyndrum, located in Loch Fyne, in Loch Lomond National Park, has been the site of lead mining for some years up to around the 1920s. Innovative geologists suspected that where there is lead, there could be gold and silver too. An Irish company did a survey some 25 years ago and found traces, but considered the recovery costs fiendishly high. In 2005, an Australian company tried their luck and also decided it would be exorbitantly expensive to mine the gold. During that time however, the price of gold has risen to some $1,800 per ounce and the costs associated with mining the mineral have now become a profitable possibility.
Scotgold projects an annual recovery of 20,000 ounces of gold and 80,000 ounces of silver, from a 2,200 sq km location in an area 40 miles north of Glasgow. The company says it’ll bring much needed jobs to the area, but the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park and Scottish National Heritage have turned down two applications from the mining company, citing concerns over the decimation of one of Scotland’s most pristine panoramas. The company is deadly serious about the project however, and has already sunk a 1.2km exploration tunnel into the mountainside. It is aware that the mine will produce a lot of waste, but has promised to take measures that will deter any kind of eyesore on the Glen. Scotgold would be the first operating gold mine in Scotland, for over 500 years, and pledges to work out it differences with both the NPA and the SNH.
Source: http://www.ujnews.com/columns/todays-britain-october-2011/
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