Chile court suspends approval of Goldcorp’s $3.9 billion El Morro project

Too early on the stop loss

Chile newspaper La Tercera is reporting that an appeals court has suspended environmental authorization for Goldcorp’s El Morro project.

According to the paper approval, first given in March last year, was withdrawn because of a lack of consultation with local communities, a charge Goldcorp denies.

Construction of the mine was due to commence in September this year at a cost of $3.9 billion over five years. $185 million was already committed for 2012.

Goldcorp said at the time of its annual results in February over its 17-year mine life, El Morro was expected to produce an average of over 210,000 ounces of gold and 200 million pounds of copper per year.

Current open pit proven and probable mineral reserves on a 100% basis total 520 million tonnes at 0.54% copper and 0.5 grams per tonne gold (6.2 billion pounds copper and 8.3 million ounces gold) and will support a 90,000 tonne-per-day concentrator according to Goldcorp.