The NICO deposit can be classified as a hydrothermal iron oxide copper-gold (IOCG) deposit.

The NICO deposit is hosted in iron- and potassium-altered, brecciated basement sedimentary rocks of the Treasure Island Group at and beneath the unconformity with the volcanic Faber Group rocks.

Cobalt-gold-bismuth-copper mineralization at NICO is intimately associated with a regionalscale metasomatic event and a later, more restricted, sulphide mineralizing event. Both the Treasure Island Group metasediments and the overlying Faber Group volcanics were subjected to intense regional potassium and iron metasomatism. In the NICO area, the combination of iron and potassium metasomatism has resulted in the creation of an assemblage of amphibole-biotite ± magnetite altered metasedimentary rocks which extend along strike for approximately 2 km. The deposit is hosted within a 200-m thick package of northwest-striking and northeast-dipping amphibole-biotite ± magnetite ironstone and schist and amphibole-biotite altered subarkosic wacke. The latter is considered to be the protolith to the ironstone/schist and becomes increasingly more abundant in the upper part of the hanging wall. The dominant amphiboles are iron-rich.

Sulphide mineralization is disseminated and makes up between 3% and 10% of the mineralized rocks. The sulphide minerals are predominantly aligned along the foliation planes. Only small native gold grains have been observed. These are mainly associated with sulphides, but also occur with silicate minerals such as feldspar (Thalenhorst and Farquharson, 2002). The sulphides consist primarily of cobaltite/cobaltian arsenopyrite,
bismuthinite and chalcopyrite.

Gold mineralization forms a central ‘bulls-eye’ to the deposit within the cobalt-bismuth core of the magnetite mineralization and is confined largely to the middle and lower zones. Two correlatable horizons of less altered subarkosic wacke partially demarcate the lower/middle and middle/upper zone boundaries (Thalenhorst and Farquharson, 2002). The upper zone is much more restricted in extent and the sulphide and Au-Co-Bi mineralization is weaker.

A minor amount of mineralization occurs in the overlying felsic extrusive/intrusive Faber Group units, and is hosted by east-west striking, sub-vertical, vein-like structures. The arsenopyrite in these near vertical zones was most likely introduced during the stage 6 mineralizing event. Sulphide intersections also occur in the cross-cutting quartz-feldspar and feldspar-amphibole ± quartz porphyry dykes. Many of the late stage felsic intrusions cutting the deposit have removed Co-Bi-Au mineralization and left blocks of relatively unmineralized rock in the centre of the deposit.

The NICO property has a number of mineral occurrences and one ore deposit, referred to as the Bowl Zone. In general, this orebody is comprised of a series of stacked stratabound lenses of ironstone that dip at approximately 50° towards the north-northeast. The mineralized zones to be mined consist of three sub-parallel lenses, approximately 40 m apart. They are referred to as the Upper, Middle and Lower Zones, which are up to 1.5 km in length, 550 m in width (down dip) and 70 m in thickness (across dip).

The Project will utilize conventional open pit mining, supplemented by trackless underground mining methods in the early years of its life. It will then convert to an open pit operation only for the remainder of its productive mine life of approximately 20 years.

Production from the open pit will be supplemented by high-grade ore mined from underground for a short period early in the Project life, in order to enhance early cash flow.

Access for underground mining will be gained by rehabilitating and deepening the existing exploration decline. It is planned to mine 21 individual stopes, generally on the retreat, using transverse and longitudinal blasthole mining methods. All underground rehabilitation, development and stoping operations will be undertaken by a contractor.

The recovery of saleable products from the NICO deposit will take place in two stages. First, a bulk flotation concentrate containing recoverable gold, cobalt, bismuth and copper will be produced at the Project site in the NWT. The bulk concentrate will then be transported by road and rail to Saskatchewan Metals Processing Plant (SMPP) for further treatment, principally by hydrometallurgical techniques, to produce separate gold, cobalt, bismuth and copper products.

The NICO Project mineral processing plant is designed for the treatment of a bismuth-cobalt-gold-copper sulphide ore from the NICO deposit, at an average design throughput rate of 4,645 t/d for 365 days per year. The processing plant at the NICO Project site will produce, on average, 167.4 dry t/d of bulk concentrate containing an average of 3.55% Bi, 3.23% Co, 25.19 g/t Au, 1.03% Cu and 13.52% S. This concentrate will be filtered using a pressure filter to approximately 8% moisture, packaged and shipped to the hydrometallurgical facility in Saskatchewan for further processing. The bulk concentrate will also have a high content of arsenic, estimated at approximately 20% As, on average.

The mineral processing facilities at the Project site are subdivided as follows:
- Ore receiving pad.
- Primary crushing.
- Secondary and tertiary crushing.
- Fine ore storage.
- Grinding.
- Gravity gold recovery.
- Flotation.
- Concentrate dewatering and packaging.
- Tailings dewatering and disposal.
- Reagent preparation.

Run-of-mine (ROM) ore will be delivered by haul trucks from the underground and open pit mines. The ore will be dumped on the ore receiving pad for further blending or staged for feeding the primary crusher with a front-end loader. The crusher will also be designed so that trucks can dump directly into the feed hopper. During periods in which the open pit produces ore in excess of the capacity of the processing plant, the surplus ore will be stockpiled and processed subsequently.

The primary crusher dump hopper is designed with a capacity of 180 t, corresponding to two truckloads, and has only one access side. Truck dumping will be controlled by the crusher operator using a system of traffic lights. A heavy-duty, hydraulic rock-breaker is provided to break up oversize boulders.

The primary crushed ore conveyor will discharge onto a 1.8 m wide by 4.8 m long doubledeck vibrating screen with openings of 75 mm on the top deck and 38 mm on the bottom.

The screen oversize from both decks will feed a HP 500 size secondary standard Symons cone crusher via a 38-t feed bin. The secondary crusher discharge and the secondary screen undersize will be conveyed to the tertiary 2.4 m wide by 7.3 m long double deck screens. The oversize (+8 mm) from each screen will feed a MP 800 short head cone crusher. The screen undersize feeds the fine ore stockpile conveyor.

The fine ore stockpile will provide crushed ore surge capacity so that the process plant can be supplied with a continuous source of feedstock. Fine ore will be fed to the mill building via three variable-speed feeders that will discharge onto the ball mill feed conveyor.

The 1,050 mm wide by 190 m long ball mill feed conveyor will discharge fine ore into a 16.5 ft diameter by 24 ft long (5.03 m by 7.32 m) ball mill, driven by a 3,200 kW motor. The mill will operate in closed circuit with a cluster of cyclones from which the overflow will feed a secondary grinding circuit, while the majority of the underflow will be recycled to the ball mill. The cyclone cluster consists of nine 381 mm diameter cyclones with eight units operating under nominal flow conditions.

A portion of the cyclone underflow will feed the gold gravity recovery circuit which includes a 828 mm wide by 4,877 mm long scalping screen fitted with a 2 mm aperture screen deck, and a gravity concentrator that will separate and concentrate fine materials with a high specific gravity. Heavy minerals, including gold, will be collected and pumped to the final concentrate thickener for dewatering and packaging with the flotation concentrates. Screen oversize and gravity tailings will gravitate to the mill cyclone feed pump box.

The secondary grinding circuit includes two 750 kW vertical mills in closed circuit with cyclones and cyclone feed pumps. The secondary grind will produce flotation feed at minus 53 µm.

The bulk rougher flotation design consists of a bank of five 70 m3 capacity circular tank type flotation cells with a total retention time of about 45 minutes. Two flotation reagents, MIBC and PAX, are added at the beginning and midway through the circuit to collect and float the valuable minerals. The remaining ground slurry will flow by gravity from the final cell to the tailings thickener for disposal.

The secondary flotation circuit comprises a bank of five 10 m3 capacity circular secondary rougher tank-type flotation cells and a bank of four 10 m3 capacity secondary cleaner (two) and scavenger-cleaner (two) cells.

The secondary cleaner concentrate will be pumped to the concentrate thickener. The secondary rougher tailings report to the final tailings pump box and thickener, while the secondary cleaner tailings will be recycled to the regrind circuit.

The final bulk concentrate, the secondary cleaner concentrate and the gravity concentrate will feed the 5.8 m diameter bulk concentrate thickener. The thickener design is conventional with a bridge-mounted drive mechanism. Thickener overflow will be pumped to the concentrator process water tank. Thickener underflow will be pumped to a storage tank, prior to feeding the bulk concentrate pressure filter. The underflow storage tank is sized to provide 12 h retention time.

The pressure filter will be a fully-automatic vertical recessed plate type filter. The discharged cake from the pressure filter will contain approximately 8% moisture. The filtrate collected in the filtrate pump box will be pumped to the concentrator process water tank. The filter cake will discharge onto the concentrate loadout conveyor.

The concentrate filter cake from the filter press will feed a concentrate packaging system. The packaging system will collect and bag concentrates for transport. Each bag will be weighed, sampled and tagged for shipment. The filter press will discharge into a hopper, allowing the bagging system to operate independently of the filter press.