Two Canadian diamond projects to see first production this quarter – by Henry Lazenby (MiningWeekly.com – July 18, 2016)

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TORONTO (miningweekly.com) – Canada has two diamond projects that are expected to start first production during the current quarter, with De Beers Canada’s Gahcho Kué project, in the Northwest Territories, making commissioning progress and Stornoway Diamond Corp starting with ore processing at the Renard project, in Quebec.

TSX-listed Stornoway on Friday announced that it had started the processing ramp-up to 2.16-million tonnes, within nine months, at 78% plant utilisation, ahead of schedule.

The operation, Quebec’s only diamond mine, would achieve commercial production, maintaining ore processing, for 30 days, at 60% nameplate capacity.

As of July 13, one-million tonnes of ore had been stockpiled, enough to start and maintain the planned ramp-up, the company advised. Initial production was based on ore sourced directly from the Renard 2/Renard 3 openpit and supplemented from the stockpile as required.

“The commencement of diamond production at Renard comes exactly two years and five days since we broke ground for mine construction. Our project execution continues to track several weeks ahead of our (already) re-baselined schedule and well within our capital budget,” stated president and CEO Matt Manson on Friday.

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