Mineralization Styles
Mineralization at Bayan Khundii consists of gold ± silver in massive-saccharoidal, laminar and comb-textured quartz ±hematite veins, multi-stage quartz-adularia-chalcedony ±hematite veins, quartz-hematite breccias, along late fractures (±hematite/ specularite), and as disseminations within intensely illite-quartz altered pyroclastic rocks, where it is commonly associated with hematite that partially or completely replaced pyrite grains. Gold mineralization is mostly hosted in parallel NW-SE trending, moderately-dipping (approximately 45°) zones that range in width from 4 to 149 m.

No gold ± silver mineralized veins or breccias have been noted in the unconformably overlying Jurassic sedimentary rocks or basalt, indicating these rocks represent an unmineralized cover sequence. Some gold ±silver enrichment has been noted in basal conglomerate containing angular, altered, and possibly mineralized Lower Carboniferous Ulziithar Formation tuff clasts, near the unconformity.

Gold mineralization at surface is present in three separate areas over a 1.7 km NE trend. These include the SW Prospect area (550 m x 300 m), the NE Prospect area (300 m x 300 m), located approximately 0.7 km to the northeast, and the NE Extension located an additional 500 m to the northeast. Most of the exploration work to date, and all of the Bayan Khundii mineral resource, lies within the SW Prospect area which includes the Gold Hill, Striker, Midfield and Nor ........

The Bayan Khundii site is comprised of the open-pit mine, processing plant and integrated waste rock and dry cake tailings storage facility. Additional infrastructure for maintenance facilities and an accommodation village are included. The proposed mine uses conventional open-pit truck and shovel methods for ore extraction.

Initial evaluation of Whittle™ pit shells was completed based on geotechnical and economic parameters to determine potentially economically minable material. The Whittle™ optimization process identified three main pit areas defined as Striker, Midfield and North Midfield. Subsequently, three stages of pit design and development were planned based on the Whittle™ optimization output. The pit exit level is approximately 1,232 meters above sea level (“MASL”) and reaches a maximum depth of 1,088 MASL at the North Midfield Pit.

Overall mining inventory within the ultimate pit design is 34.6 million tonnes (“Mt”) of which 31.2 Mt is classified as waste and 3.4 Mt is classified as ore. The average grade for process plant feed is 3.7 g/t gold containing approximately 409 thousand ounces (“Koz”) of gold in total.

The designed process plant throughput rate is 600 thousand tonnes per annum (“Ktpa”) with 450Ktpa for the first year of operations and 600 Ktpa from Year 2 onwards. The total productive mine life is 6 years, with an additional 3 months of pre-production to generate waste for construction of the run-of -mine stockpile ( ........

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The process plant design basis has an overall plant operating time of 92% or 8,060 hours per annum. The process plant has been designed to produce up to approximately 79.0 Koz/a gold as doré bar (Yr 5), but averages approximately 63.5 Koz over the life of mine.

Key criteria selected for the process plant design are:
• Ore throughput of 600,000 tpa, or 1,800 tonnes per day;
• Nominal feed Size of 300 mm, based on the small block size, and close pattern drill and blast;
• Grinding product of nominal P80 of 60 µm;
• Plant operating time of 92%;
• Average ore head grade of 3.71 g/t for gold;
• Ore head grade capped at 4.5 g/t planned over a month interval;
• Short term head grade capped at 6 g/t (constrained by the elution capacity); and
• LOM average gold recovery of 93%.

The Bayan Khundii orebody is a relatively simple ore to process in that it is a gold orebody containing some silver, has low levels of sulphide and base meta ........