PERTH (miningweekly.com) – ASX-listed junior Horseshoe Metals would have to wait for an increase in commodity prices before considering the development of its Horseshoe Lights copper-gold project, in Western Australia.
A scoping study into the project, which is estimated to host some 12.85-million tonnes of resource, grading 1% copper and 0.1 g/t gold, for 128 600 t of contained copper and 36 000 oz of gold, had revealed that the current commodity prices made the project sub-economic.
The scoping study incorporated three varying copper prices, based on a production target of one-million tonnes a year.
Horseshoe said on Friday that while the project proved to be sub-economic under prevailing commodity prices and modeled costs, there was significant upside potential for the development of mining operations if an upsurge in prices occurred.
“The present global outlook is for long-term copper prices to trend above existing levels. Combining this with the widely forecasted outlook for continuation of the fall in the Australia: US dollar exchange rates, means the Australian dollar copper price should increase significantly in the future,” the miner said.
Horseshoe told shareholders that the company’s focus would now be on adding additional resource to the Horseshoe Lights project, with the company also assessing surface stockpiles, tailings and mineralised dumps for low-cost processing options.
A mineral resource estimate update and a scoping study update would be undertaken following the completion of the next phase of drilling.