New veins, new team, new gold: Aguia’s Colombian reset
Warwick Grigor, chairman of Aguia Resources, said:“Analysis results from the newly discovered artisan gallery reveal a vein strike direction that clearly demonstrates the connection between the main vein sets used in Santa Barbara. Additionally, the introduction of an entirely new management team, both corporate and operational, has had a very positive impact on the Santa Barbara operation.”
Over the past two months, the company has overhauled its entire operational management in Colombia, replacing its unskilled workforce with in-country experts with deep experience in narrow-seam mining and gold processing.
Since then, Aguia says there has been a dramatic improvement in both mineral grade control and facility upgrading. Thanks to the adoption of more selective mining techniques, dilution has been reduced and feed grades now regularly exceed 10 g/t gold.
On the processing front, Aguia’s plant is starting to move forward with a series of deliberate upgrades that are already yielding results, with even more changes in the pipeline to continue gaining momentum.
By adjusting the mill outlet to a finer grind (so that 80 percent of the ore particles are smaller than 44 microns) Aguia achieved an average sweet spot of 50 microns, freeing up more gold.
To speed up processing and increase gold recoveries, management will replace the 20HP mill engines with more powerful 40HP units, fine-tune the mixing circuit and fine-tune the Merrill-Crowe extraction system.
The company now also adds cyanide early in the process (during grinding), reducing leach tank time and allowing it to potentially increase plant efficiency without any recovery losses. Currently, over 90 percent metallurgical recovery is targeted.
Aguia says several changes are starting to deliver the goods. Doré bars were produced and shipped to a refinery in Medellin, marking a symbolic milestone for the project and a vote of confidence in the new strategy.
With a revamped operational team, a facility operating at higher efficiency, and a new vein system that has the potential to connect the entire goldfield, Aguia may be ushering in a new golden age in Santa Barbara.
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