Uranium find warrants issuance of mining licence

Jan 27, 2009 News

…as Omai’s revegetation program renegotiated – PM

Prime Minister Samuel Hinds this past week told media operatives that the recent announcement that there may be some 5.8 million pounds of uranium is satisfactory evidence that will warrant the issuance of a mining license for the extraction of the mineral.

PM Samuel Hinds

The Prime Minister was offering a review and projection of the mining sector at the Guyana Geology and Mines Commission headquarters.
On Friday last, a Canadian uranium exploration company reported that an independent consulting firm had completed a resource estimate for the Aricheng North and Aricheng South structures, located in the basement near the Roraima Basin in Guyana, where it was found that there is an indicated resource of 5.8 million pounds of uranium at an average grade of 0.10 percent, along with an additional inferred resource of 1.3 million pounds of uranium at an average grade of 0.09 percent.
President and Chief Executive Officer of U308 Corporation, Richard Spencer, said that the initial resource estimate is an important milestone. “Mineralisation at Aricheng South and Aricheng North remains open for expansion, and further drilling has the potential to considerably increase this initial resource figure.
Our focus is now to determine whether other mineralized structures in the Kurupung Batholith can contribute to a significantly larger uranium resource,” the company’s president said.
It was explained that U3O8 Corp’s exploratory drilling has defined a number of uranium-bearing structures in the basement that could increase this initial resource.
Accori North C is the next structure with the potential to add a maximum number of pounds to the company’s uranium resource for the lowest drill metreage.
Uranium mineralization at Aricheng South and Aricheng North lies within fracture zones and breccias within the Kurupung Batholith in the basement, approximately five kilometres from the Roraima Basin.
U3O8 Corporation is a Canadian uranium exploration company based in Toronto, Canada.
Uranium is a very dense, radioactive metallic element, naturally occurring in rocks, soil, and even in the ocean. Uranium is found as an oxide or complex salt in minerals such as pitchblende and carnotite.
It is formed from volcanic activity, and has an average concentration in the earth’s crust of about 2 parts per million.
Uranium was named after the planet Uranus, although the metal is not very common in the solar system. It does, however, provide the main source of heat inside the earth. Uranium is mined for many different purposes, and has been used to produce energy for more than forty years.
Prime Minister Hinds also touched on the issue of the revegetation aspect of Omai Gold Mines’ operation in Guyana, which he said has had to be renegotiated.
According to Hinds, when the company ceased mining …it had to commence a re-vegetation process of the mined out areas.
It has been pointed out, however, that there is in excess of two million ounces of gold on the concession, but it has to be tunnelled out.
The Prime Minister noted that, given that there is a substantial amount of gold present, and the fact that several pieces of the Omai Gold Mines infrastructure still on site could be used as such, the revegetation process has been subject to renegotiation.
In October last, Omai Gold Mines handed over the mines to the Government of Guyana.
In1993, the company commenced actual extraction of gold. It ended its operation in 2005, but had to stay on for three more years to fulfill its obligations as these related to ensuring that the site was environmentally safe, given the wide-scale use of cyanide.
An August 1995 dam failure caused the spillage of cyanide into the Essequibo River.
Omai Gold Mines Ltd, the mine’s operator, had repeatedly said that the dam was safe, but three smaller spills had already prompted calls for Guyana to review its relationship with the company.
Omai Gold Mines joint venture partners include Cambior Inc, Golden Star Resources, and the Guyana Government.
During the more than a decade-long period, the company extracted some 3.7 million ounces of gold, paying only five per cent of that in royalties to Guyana.