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Location
Citigold's Charters Towers goldfield is located underneath and surrounding the City of Charters Towers (8,500 population) in north eastern Queensland, Australia. The Charters Towers mines are situated 128 kilometres southwest of the major coastal City of Townsville (170,000 population) and are on the main Flinders Highway leading west from Townsville to the inland mining city of Mt. Isa. Townsville is a major road, rail, sea and air transport terminus and is located approximately 1,100 kilometres north of Brisbane and 2,000 kilometres north of Sydney.
Golden Pedigree
Citigold's Charters Towers gold deposit is Australia's largest bonanza grade gold deposit with mineral Resources of 10 million ounces of gold.
Our Charters Towers goldfield is the home of Australia’s richest goldfield having produced 6,600,000 ounces (205 tonnes) of gold over a 46 year period with an incredible average ore grade of 38 grams (1.25 ounces) per tonne. This gold was mainly produced from one of the five major goldfield structures – the other four are mainly unexplored. Citigolds Charters Towers gold deposit is Australia’s largest bonanza grade gold deposit with current mineral resources of 10 million ounces of gold. Since 2004 for the first time in history one company, Citigold Corporation, controls 100% of this distinguished deep sourced goldfield. Only a small part of the gold deposit has been worked leaving the rest for Citigold. The historical mines were very profitable paying an estimated $900 million in dividends to their shareholders, in today’s dollars. Our current high grade gold mine operations proves there are many rich reefs waiting to be mined.
Underground Mining
Mining operations at Charters Towers are by underground mining methods. The gold deposits are hosted in very strong granodiorite rock that has a compressive strength of 150m.p.a or five times stronger than commercial grade concrete. This makes for good mechanised mining conditions.
The gold deposits are accessed by two Declines (downward sloping tunnels). Mining method is modern drill and blast technique. The underground tunnel system is complex and requires careful design and engineering based on the geological mine design setting out where the valuable ore is located.
The technical mining method is mechanised (long-hole open stoping on 15 metre sub-levels, trackless diesel haulage) which allows for low-cost operations. Operating costs target A$350 per ounce and the current Australian gold price around A$1000 ounce produces strong margins.
Gold bearing ore is then hauled from the surface of the mine by truck on the approved City public heavy haulage road route for 12 kilometres to the gold extraction plant.
Gold Extraction
The gold extraction plant is located away from the populated areas of the City about 10 kilometres south west of the City centre along the Gregory Developmental Road (Clermont Highway).
The plant is a conventional CIL (Carbon In Leach) plant with a capacity to process about 340,000 tonnes per year of gold bearing rock. There is also a gravity gold recovery circuit within the overall plant design to recover the coarse gold particles which allows high grade ore to be processed through the CIL plant.
The plants gold production capacity will be expanded by the addition of a larger automated gravity gold circuit that will collect the high grade gold. With the planned future pre-concentration of ore underground as a part of the mining process the plant feedgrade could increase to 20g/t and therefore could produce 250,000 ounces with the current crushing, milling and leaching circuit.
The plant outputs gold 'dore' bars (containing about 50% gold and 30% silver) which are then shipped by secure transport to a gold bullion refiner where the gold and silver are refined and the mine is paid for these valuable metals.
Mine Management
Citigold's management focus is to dramatically increase shareholder value by strategically developing highly profitable and sustainable gold production from the enormously rich mining lands of Charters Towers.
Mining is conducted principally by owner staffed and operated plant and equipment. Exploration drilling is conducted by contractors. As the project expands it is expected that the number of contractors will increase. The Company currently has about 110 personnel at Charters Towers.
Citigold operates at two sites - the underground mine and the gold extraction plant. Administration is located at the gold extraction plant. As the other underground mines are opened up on the adjacent parallel reefs (ie Sunburst, Brilliant, etc) they will all feed the ore to the one central gold extraction plant.
Mineral Tenements
Citigold's granted mineral tenements cover an extensive area of over 360 square kilometers (36,000 hectares) in the heart of the rich Charters Towers goldfield.
These tenements comprise (a) Mining Leases where we are operating and expanding the gold mines, including the Warrior area; (b) Mineral Development Licenses that cover the direct extensions to the mining areas in readiness for future conversion into Mining Leases prior to gold production, and (c) Exploration Permits Minerals that we are drilling and exploring to expand the gold deposits.
The Mining Leases grant to Citigold exclusive mining rights to the valuable metals. Gold and silver are the principal valuable metals mined by Citigold and we pay a royalty to the Queensland State Government of 2.7% of the sale price of gold and silver extracted.
The core of the mineral tenements with an area of about 100 square kilometres from the heart of the goldfield and contain the five major east-west Reef Structures. Reef Structure 1 comprises the majority of the historical gold production from the 10 major mines including the Brilliant, Day Dawn and Queen. Citigold's operational Charters Towers Warrior mine is located on Reef Structure 5 within granted Mining Leases situated 5km south east of the City centre on Bluff Road.
Safety, Health, Environment and Community
Citigold is committed to maintaining its “social licence to operate” by the practise of and adherence to high standards of occupational health, safety and environment (OHS&E). In accordance with its mission statement "to generate profits for shareholders"... the number one priority of both management and staff is "to explore for and produce gold profitably and sustainable without harming our employees, the community or the environment".
Over the past four years Citigold has adopted and further developed the world's leading five star risk and safety management system of the National Occupational Safety Association (NOSA). Citigold has successfully sustained world-class standards through its involvement with employees at all levels and strongly encourages employees as well as management to contribute directly to risk management decisions.
Environmental permits and government approved environmental management systems have been granted and are in place. The gold project operates in harmony with the local community of Charters Towers and its surrounding environment. Citigold ensures its various mine site activities adhere to and reflect quality standards as mandated by strict environmental legislation, industry practice and procedure. The Company has had no reportable environmental incidents since 2000.
(Updated August 2008)
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