There be more gold in them thar hills! I’m sure there is!
Your recent article about Lode Gold’s plans to revive the gold industry in our county has prompted me to offer my two cents on the matter.
First of all, Lode Gold is at least the second or third outfit to attempt this project and I wonder what happened to the others, why did they back out? As for the proposed project, what a great advantage to have existing tunnels to work from and be able to locate the crushing operation in an underground “ballroom” (a golden ballroom?).
This will reduce excavation costs and noise and dust. Also, the milling will be done inside a building on the surface, again less ambient noise. But crushing and milling are only the initial parts of the gold extraction process.
After milling, they’ll have a gold ore slurry to be processed. The dominant method for refining gold is a cyanide extraction method although, depending on ore characteristics, a method using mercury could also be applied. Either way, the process will necessarily involve the use of some highly toxic materials.
Once the gold has been retrieved, the leftover slurry must be dealt with, usually by first letting the water evaporate off before disposing or the leftover toxic sludge. This is often done with a series of evaporation ponds that must be designed to prevent percolation of the toxic cocktail into the groundwater or being washed out with runoff water.
Although the projected processing rate of between 350 to 600 tons per day is a relatively small operation in the wider world of mining, it is still significant enough to potentially cause some environmental damage, especially if done under nil regulations.
One might estimate about one cubic yard for each ton of material, so roughly 350 up to 600 yards of tailings would be generated each day of operation, and these things operate 24/7/365.
Where does Lode Gold propose to dispose of all this material? How much water will the process consume?
I found it concerning that Lode Gold is banking on an Administrative Use Permit instead of a Conditional Use Permit. Would an AUP mean that the BOS can approve the project without input from the county’s citizens?
It is also mentioned that they hope to expedite the permitting process to take advantage of relaxed regulations under the current administration, or as Ms. Chan said: “The environment right now is very conducive to mining.” An unfortunate choice of words to call it an “environment.”
Another point is the mention of two types of jobs: “operating joy sticks and arranging trucking schedules.”
The later suggests that the project will add a significant amount of truck traffic on the Golden Chain scenic highway. But then, an AUP may not require a traffic study so maybe nobody will notice.
In short, there are a number of important questions yet to be answered, so I would like to see more reporting about the progress being made on this ambitious project.
Rob Fox is a resident of Catheys Valley.
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