Abramovitch is not in the game for the long term viability of UCG, he needs the tech to get gold out of the ground. I wrote the following posts months and months ago, they cover, I believe, the definitive reason for RA's interest.
Highland Gold.
Enjoy. ................. This mine acquisition was first mentioned in June last year in the Russian papers and ALL of RA's clean energy investments have been made in the time after this deal was first made public. I come across it in November after the Chinchilla visit. Highland is owned by RA through Millhouse Capital. And the mine I'm interested in is in a region in which RA was once the Governor. SO, it stacks up...
My theory goes that the RA investments in W2T, AFC, AlterNRG, OCG, AFC and LNC are for this mine.
This is a quote from the last article, "It is worth noting that Kekura is located in a remote and economically-undeveloped area. Therefore it will have to rely on diesel plants for power."
The mention of a "Pilot plant" throughout these articles should also get peoples ears up...
............. "Kekura is at an advanced stage of development and hosts construction camp facilities for employees and contractors with an independent diesel power supply and ancillary systems already installed. A 150,000 tonnes per annum pilot plant is currently under construction with commissioning expected during H2 2013. The pilot plant is expected to operate through to the end of construction and commissioning of the envisaged main processing facility. This is expected to be fully operational by 2017 with anticipated production ranging from 180,000 – 220,000 oz of gold per annum via 800,000 – 1,000,000 tonnes of ore being processed each year over a minimum ten year production life."
.............. I was asked if there's any coal nearby the Highland mines that would be appropriate for UCG. And it's not a bad question!
So to add to the above links I've spent the past few hours scoping out the Chukotka for coal deposits close to the Highlands mines.
Highland has two mine projects in the Chukotka, the Klen and Kekura. These are about 200km apart.
If you have a look at this map [link below] you will see the coal deposit that runs close to the Klen and Kekura mines is clearly shown [although the mines are not shown on the map itself, you can cross reference the map with one in the report at the end of this post on slide 22. There are also numerous other maps in Google that show this deposit if you want a more colorful picture].
So while I can't find a specific reference to coal within a stones throw of Highlands tenements [mainly because all the references to these area's are preoccupied with gold in media reports etc], I can be sure there is coal there.
Importantly, the Klen project was purchased with as accompanying exploration permit called the Verkhne-Krichalskaya or (VK). It's very large, and in my opinion will most likely cover some of the coal deposits close by.
Have a look at this presentation, particularly slide 9 where it mentions "VK property (996 km2) – [is a] large area with high potential to contribute a substantial amount of quality resources to the future Klen operation". Some of those resources may well be coal.
