You’ve heard the story before. The one about that promising mine project that was supposed to become the investment of the decade, or a prime producing mine. But it wasn’t.
Several projects end up disappointing hopeful investors not only due to community opposition or legal hurdles, but because they were not properly evaluated by the so-called experts.
Project evaluation experts require an understanding of much more than hard-data.
Objective reports require an understanding of much more than hard-data. They need professionals able to identify uncertainties and complexities inherently associated with mining projects.
A well-rounded project evaluation course should be the place to start. From March 1 to 3, leader in professional development and training for the mining industry — EduMine — is presenting a three-day live webcast by Micah Nehring, lecturer in the Mine Planning stream of courses at The University of Queensland, Australia.
The course, divided into three sessions of three hours each, examines a number of valuation techniques to identify the viability of mining projects.
It also addresses the key issue of how such projects may be financed, a crucial consideration these days in light of the sustained rout in commodity prices that has severely hit the mining industry.
For more information and to register, please visit: http://www.edumine.com/courses/live-webcasts/project-evaluation-strategy/
Comments
Art Easian
No, not at all. 1,2 and 3 are not the answer; they are the problem. The failures are due to total ignorance of the geology of said problem deposits. Without knowing the detailed geology of a given deposit it is impossible to get a resource estimate correct, much less any sort of PEA, prefeas, or feasibility study. If the engineers even get close it would be luck around a very forgiving deposit. A geologist with experience would correlate the zones, not the assays. A geologist would produce longitudinal sections of each zone. He would block out resources for each zone and treat waste as waste, unless it was unavoidable.
Engineers these days dream in technicolour of lumping and mining everything to maximise tonnage. Problem is – there is no money in blasting, mucking or hauling waste. Mining waste along with good grade is a chumps game. It may make money on a spreadsheet, but due to the irreducible tails and the nugget effect, one never achieves the metal predicted on the spreadsheet and the project fails to meet expectations. The lower the grade, and the higher the tonnage, the thinner the margin and a small percentage of shortfall leaves no room for error.
Spreadsheets do not make mines.