NORTHWEST TERRITORIES – Dominion Diamond Corp. of Whitehorse, YT, has shared its updated mineral resources and new mine plan for the Ekati diamond mine at Lac de Gras. The Misery Satellite estimate is now inferred, rather than being an exploration target. The deposit contains 3.9 million inferred tonnes containing 5.0 million ct. The material is recoverable using open pit methods.
At this time productions comes from the Misery, Pigeon and Lynx open pits as well as the Koala and Koala North underground mines. The Fox pit was exhausted earlier this year. The Misery Main pipe is being stripped for production in 2016 and lasting two years. Stripping of the Pigeon pit will begin this year, and production from it is to begin in 2016 but continue into 2020.
Dominion noted that the 4.35 t/y Ekati process plant has excess capacity. The company plans to process additional material from Koala North, Misery Northeast and coarse ore reject stockpiles to increase the volume of kimberlite passing through it.
Changes are also being made to the plant to improve recovery. Vigilance at the high pressure grinding roll has resulted in less coarse feed being pushed through to the heavy media separators. That has boosted the overall liberation of diamonds. Running the HMS at lower speeds also improved recovery. New cyclones have been ordered for the HMS circuit to expand the capacity. Recrushing will be re-established to cut down on diamond losses in coarse ore reject. Three more grease tables will be installed this year, bringing the total number up to five.
Additional details of the Ekati mine plan are available in the news release dated July 21, 2014, and posted at DDCorp.ca.
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