Standalone project including relocation of Touquoy processing plant
Highlights
• Fifteen Mile Stream Project in Nova Scotia to be designed as standalone 1.7 to 1.8 Mtpa processing facility
• Touquoy Processing Plant to be substantially relocated to Fifteen Mile Stream
• Ausenco update of project design, capital and operating cost estimates to prefeasibility level due November 2023
• Significantly improved environmental design criteria incorporating stakeholder engagement on previous design
• Project design parameters targeting ten-year mine life and 60,000 ounces per annum average gold production
• Updated Mineral Resources and Ore Reserve due in November 2023
St Barbara Limited (“St Barbara” or the “Company”) (ASX: SBM) has completed concept level evaluations and determined that
the relocation of the bulk of the Touquoy Processing Plant to Fifteen Mile Stream for a standalone whole ore leach facility of
between 1.7 and 1.8 Mtpa throughput is the preferred development pathway for the next phase of the Company’s Atlantic
business.
Fifteen Mile Stream is approximately 40 kilometres east-northeast of the Touquoy Mine, while the Company’s Beaver Dam project
is mid-way between the Fifteen Mile Stream Project and the Touquoy Mine (see Figure 1).
Ausenco is working with the St Barbara study team to complete an updated process plant design and capital and operating cost
estimates by early November 2023. The Touquoy Processing Plant was designed and built by Ausenco. In parallel, the Mineral
Resources and Ore Reserves estimates for Fifteen Mile Stream will be updated for this revised basis of design by St Barbara and
Moose Mountain Technical Services.
The Touquoy Processing Plant was commissioned in 2017 with a nameplate throughput rate of 2.0 Mtpa. Whilst the Fifteen Mile
Stream ores are expected to be harder and require finer product size compared to the ore from Touquoy Mine, the processing
plant is more than capable of achieving the targeted throughput rate of 1.7 and 1.8 Mtpa. Significant savings in capital costs will
be realised through the re-use of equipment from the Touquoy Processing Plant.
In addition, previous testwork indicates that there is a significant gold recovery improvement for whole ore leach processing at
Fifteen Mile Stream compared to the previous plan to produce a gold concentrate for final gold recovery at Touquoy.
St Barbara Managing Director and CEO Andrew Strelein said: “This new design for Fifteen Mile Stream is an excellent alternative
pathway to development with improved recoveries and with lower overall capital cost and execution risk. Given the delays in
approvals to our in-pit tailings proposal it is time to move away from the earlier design which integrated with the Touquoy Mine.
This is a simpler standalone proposition with design parameters targeting a ten year mine life and approximately 60,000 ounces per annum.”

see & read more on
https://stbarbara.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/2023.08.16-asx-fifteen-mile-stream-update.pdf