Mining methods, page-4

Sorry, but I feel a bit like Big Kev with this.

For those who didn't read the report, In situ recovery works like this. A series of holes are drilled along the orebody, or whatever part of it that you want to mine and the ore body is then blasted, ala fracking. Then water along with the relevant leaching agents and the minerals are dissolved into a concentrate, much like the concentrate that would be produced in a traditional mine. I believe though that the concentrate produced In situ is of inferior quality to the traditionally produced stuff, but without the expense of digging a huge hole in the ground and setting up a processing plant. Re the financial side - it costs about $10,000.00 per tonne to produce, but not that costly to initially set up. Please don't quote me on my figures here, I'm no expert.

There are environmental plusses with this. No hole in the ground nor diesel giants running around everywhere. But the issue is with the local water tables. Acids are used, somehow, along with other chemicals that could easily pollute local water systems. I think the local rock needs to be favourable for this too.

Bottom line though, if the SGQ ores are either above or below existing water tables, and the host rock is the right one, well, let's drill a few holes - make a few blasts and turn this stuff into concentrate. If it actually costs 10,000 bucks to produce this stuff, then, bye bye capitol raises.

But then again, maybe it's all a dream