Hi fitnfam,Think you pretty well covered all the bases in your...

Hi fitnfam,

Think you pretty well covered all the bases in your post so the next move becomes a matter of prioritizing some of the matters/issues raised, so I would like to throw a curved ball into the mix.

Production capacity at Three Mile Hill needs to be addressed very quickly as FML is moving to a position where it will soon be producing more ore than the current mill can handle.

A quick minor upgrade will provide a bit more capacity but will not provide much of a longer term solution.

One solution could be to move the CRE Barnicoat Mill (purchase or lease) to Coolgardie where it could be brought on line fairly quickly thanks to the better infrastructure (grid power, scheme water, good roads, access to better maintenance facilities).

While there are arguments that this mill could be employed at either Laverton, the Mount or Treasure Island, the economics of use, or the time frames in these locations is questionable.

CRE have already figured out that the operating costs of the Barnicoat Mill are too expensive for the grade of ore that they currently mining, or propose to mine based on their JORC estimates., and this economic reason is why CRE and now FML are happy with the toll treating arrangement with Barrick (who due to its larger mill has much more cost effective milling costs).

If the Summit underground mine, with its higher grades was in operation then the economics would no doubt change, however it would probably take a minimum of two years to bring this on line, with the Barnicoat Mill sitting idle in the meantime.

Moving the Barnicoat Mill to the Mount does not seem to make sense as the mill would be operating well below capacity as there is just not enough ore in the production pipeline, plus it would take time to resolve to resolve infrastructure matters.

Whether the higher grade ore at the Mount might make the operation profitable at reduced capacity would have to be judged against the costs of milling it at Three Mile Hill.

Currently, there is no justification for moving the Barnicoat Mill to Treasure Island in terms of a resource base, to say nothing of the fact that there is zero infrastructure to facilitate such a move – again the mill could be sitting there idle for two years (more likely three).

Any thoughts on this?

Cheers, kentwang