The Trough, otherwise known as the Labrador Quebec Fold Belt, extends for more than 1,100 km along the eastern margin of the Superior Craton from Ungava Bay to Lake Pletipi, Quebec. The belt is about 100 km wide in its central part and narrows considerably to the north and south. Adriana’s Property is located north of the Grenville Front in the Churchill Province where the Trough rocks have been subject to greenschist or subgreenschist grade metamorphism and the principal iron formation unit is known as the Sokoman Formation. The lithological units of interest on the Property due to their iron content are members of the Sokoman.

The Lac Otelnuk deposits are composed of iron formations of the Lake Superior-type. This type of iron formation consists of banded sedimentary rocks composed principally of bands of magnetite and hematite within quartz (chert)-rich rock, with variable amounts of silicate, carbonate and sulphide lithofacies. Such iron formations have been the principal sources of iron throughout the world. Lithofacies that are not highly metamorphosed or altered by weathering are referred to as taconite and the Lac Otelnuk deposits are examples of this type.

Mineralization in the iron formation consists mainly of magnetite (Fe3O4) and hematite (Fe2O3), however, some iron also occurs in siderite and ferro-ankerite. Iron oxide bands containing concentrations of magnetite and/or hematite alternate with grey chert of jasper.

The mining method selected for the Project is a conventional open pit consisting of drilling and blasting and a truck and shovel operation with a designed bench height of 15 m. Trees will be cleared prior to the start of mining Next, a mining contractor will remove the topsoil and overburden using a fleet of dozers, excavators and haul trucks. The ore and waste rock will be drilled, blasted, and then loaded with large mining shovels into a fleet of rigid frame trucks which will haul the material either to the primary crushers, the low grade stockpiles, or the mine rock piles (for the waste rock).

The mining operations for the Project will be 365 days per year, operating around the clock on two (2) 12-hour shifts. A total of five (5) days per year have been accounted for when the mine will be shut down due to severe weather conditions. During these periods, the primary crushers will be fed from the run of mine ore stockpiles using front end wheel loaders.

A mine plan was developed for the 30-year life of the open pit which follows the phased approach of the Feasibility Study, producing 30 Mt/y of concentrate in Phase 1 and 50 Mt/y of concentrate in Phase 2. One of the goals of the mine plan is to ensure that several different ore types are always in production in order to avoid fluctuations in grade and hardness. Blending of the different ores will occur at the primary crushers as trucks arrive from different shovels that are mining the different ore types. Blending will also happen directly at the shovel face since several ore types may be present within a given 15 m high bench.

A 6-month period of pre-production has been included in the mine plan to prepare the pit for operations. During pre-production, 2.1 Mt of overburden will be stripped and four (4) Mt of ore will be stockpiled.

In order to improve the economics of the Project, mining will begin in the southeastern corner of the open pit where there is a considerable area of high grade ore. This high grade zone is limited to the 2a and 2b ore types at the top of the iron formation. In order to ensure the proper blending of ore types, a second area will be developed at the start of the operation on the western side of the deposit, adjacent to the primary crushers. This area will provide the 2c, 3a and 3b ore types. Both of these mining areas will be developed at an even pace for the first seven (7) years of the operation.

Mining will begin in the northern part of the open pit in Year 7 to prepare for Phase 2, when the additional two (2) primary crushers will be installed. During Phase 2, 1/3of the production will come from the northern part of the open pit and 2/3from the southern part. The purpose of this split in production is to optimize the use of the five (5) primary crushers.

Primary Crushers
Primary crushing is performed by five large-capacity gyratory crushers:
• Phase 1 comprises three crushers
• Phase 2 comprises two additional crushers at a different location.

The crushers are all located at a minimum of approximately 0.5 km from the mine pit for safety reasons during blasting. The ore is transported from the mine to the primary crushers by 400 ton (short ton) haul trucks.

A one-day emergency ore storage capacity area is provided close to each crusher for unexpected situations. This ore can be charged directly to the crushers by using front end loaders.

At each primary crusher, two (2) ore unloading points are located at 180° to each other. Since two trucks can approach the ore discharge chute simultaneously, this arrangement is safer and facilitates truck approach while it eliminates waiting time.

The process plant utilization factor is 90 %, while the primary crushers are at 70 % utilization factor. The capacity of each crusher at 70 % utilization factor is therefore 6,154 t/h. The supply rate of the ore conveyed to the stockpile at the process plant is greater than the capacity being processed. When all crushers are operating, the overcapacity is used to replenish the plant stockpile. This ensures sufficient supply whenever one of the primary crushers is not operating.

The semi-mobile primary crushers and all ancillary equipment are installed outdoors. A small heated operation building is provided. Water-spray dust suppression is provided at the truck-unloading pit.

Semi-Autogenous Grinding (SAG) Mills and Classification
Three (3) SAG mills per train, installed in parallel, will reduce ore size to a P80 of about 800 microns.

Each SAG mill is designed for a fresh iron ore feed of 1,755 t/h. The calculated required power for each SAG mill is 23.5 MW. The SAG mill dimensions are 12.2 m (40 feet) diameter and 7.6 m equivalent grinding length (EGL), which is the biggest size of proven technology operating today. The SAG mill is driven by gearless drive motor (also called wrap-around motor).

The SAG mills are provided with all auxiliaries for lubrication and tools for liner replacement. An automatic ball-feeding system shared by all the SAG mills consists of conveyor and diverter gates. The ball-feeding system will supply 125 mm diameter balls to the SAG feed chutes at a regular and controllable feed rate.

The product from the SAG mill is discharged into a diversion box that splits the flow into two parallel 3.35 mm cut size screens.

Oversize material, assumed at 30 %, is recirculated via conveyors to the feed chute of the SAG.

Product that passes the screens flows to a pump box and is pumped to the next separation stage.

Cobber Low Intensity Magnetic Separators (LIMS)
The underflow of the screen is pumped to distribution boxes that equally feed cobber LIMS which are installed in parallel. Each production train features thirty (30) cobber LIMS, six (6) of which are on stand-by. These single-stage counter-flow LIMS separate magnetic material from non-magnetic material. The underflow of the screen is pumped to distribution boxes that equally feed cobber LIMS which are installed in parallel. Each production train features thirty (30) cobber LIMS, six (6) of which are on stand-by. These single-stage counter-flow LIMS separate magnetic material from non-magnetic material.

Magnetic material will flow by gravity to the next stage of grinding (first-stage ball mill).

First-Stage Ball Mills and Classification
On each train, two (2) ball mill circuits will operate in parallel in a closed circuit with a hydrocyclone cluster, operating with a recirculation rate of 250 % of the underflow.

The overflow of the hydrocyclones will be transferred to the next stage of magnetic separation (rougher LIMS).

Each first-stage ball mill is designed for a feed rate at 4,260 t/h. The ball mills are gear driven with synchronized dual pinion. The calculated required power for each of the two pinion-drive motors is 7,650 kW. The ball mill dimensions are 7.9 m (26 feet) diameter and 12.66 m EGL. The ball mills are provided with all auxiliaries and tools for liners replacement.

An automatic ball-feeding system (similar to that of the SAG mill and shared by all firststage ball mills) will convey 50 mm diameter balls to each feed chute at a regular and controllable feed rate.

Rougher LIMS
Similar to the cobber LIMS, the rougher LIMS recovering magnetic concentrate are singlestage, counter-flow type but they operate at a lower intensity. Two (2) levels of distribution boxes direct the slurry to the LIMS. Each production train features 32 rougher separators, four (4) of which are on stand-by.

Non-magnetic material (rougher tailings) will flow by gravity to the tailings thickener. Magnetic product will be re-slurried and pumped back to the second-stage ball mill.


Second-Stage Ball Mill and Classification
On each train, a single second-stage ball mill will operate in closed circuit with a cyclone cluster from where the overflow product, D80 = about 48 microns, will flow by gravity to the hydro-separators (also called de-sliming thickeners).

The second-stage ball mill is designed for a feed rate of 6,026 t/h. It is driven by a 25 MW gearless motor wrapped around the rotating shell. The ball mill dimensions are 8.5 m (28 feet) diameter and 15.44 m EGL. The second-stage ball mill is provided with all auxiliaries and tools for liner replacement.

Since the first-stage and second-stage ball mills are located in the same area, they share the same overhead cranes and liner handler. This facilitates maintenance, operation, and access.

An automatic ball-feeding system shared by the second stage ball mills of every train, will convey 28 mm diameter balls to each feed chute at a regular and controllable feed rate.

The process plant will treat magnetite ore extracted from the Lac Otelnuk open pit mine located in the Nunavik region of the province of Quebec, about midway north in the Labrador Trough iron range, to produce a concentrate. The operation will mill approximately 188.7 Mt/y of iron bearing mineralization to produce 50 Mt/y of magnetite concentrate.

The Project will be developed in two phases: Phase 1 will produce 30 Mt/y of iron ore concentrate and Phase 2 will produce 20 Mt/y to bring the plant to 50 Mt/y capacity. The process plant involves multiple grinding and milling stages followed by a conventional magnetite recovery circuit with desliming thickeners and magnetic separators to produce a pellet feed iron concentrate.

Process Plant General Description
In Phase 1, three independent ore processing trains are installed. Each train produces nominally 10 Mt/y of iron ore concentrate (dry basis).

In Phase 2, two independent ore processing ........