TORONTO (miningweekly.com) – Alacer Gold on Monday announced that it would use whole-ore pressure oxidation (POX) as the method for processing sulphide ore at its Çöpler gold mine, in Erzincan province, Turkey.

Alacer recently completed an exhaustive technical review that confirmed that the POX process would provide the best economic return for processing the Çöpler sulfide ore.

"Alacer has examined all processing options in a systematic, organised and disciplined manner. We believe that the approach to project development that we are announcing today will maximise our portfolio value while minimising project risk and delivering the best return to our shareholders," CEO Rodney Antal said.

The decision had been a long time in the making, and given the current gold price environment and volatile market conditions, Antal stressed that the company had taken a deliberate approach to growing its business.

Alacer's near-term organic growth would be focused on developing the sulphide ore at the mine. The sulphide ore comprises about 62% of the total 120.9-million tonnes grading 1.5 g/t gold in the measured and indicated resource categories, or six-million contained gold ounces out of the total 8.5-million contained gold ounces.

The ASX- and TSX-listed company said it was taking a phased approach to the project, whereby it would design a 5 000 t/d plant that could be scaled up if conditions warrant in the future. A definitive feasibility study (DFS) was currently under way and the results were expected in June 2014, after which the board would decide whether to proceed to detailed engineering and construction of the project.

Alacer said it believed that the DFS would demonstrate that the POX project was economically compelling in the current market environment.

Further, the POX project was expected to benefit from the competitive advantages that doing business in Turkey offered, including good infrastructure and low labour and power costs.

"The staged approach for development of the sulphides provides several benefits to Alacer: The smaller POX plant lowers the capital intensity and de-risks the project as a whole while retaining the option to scale up the project and potentially increase throughput in the future,” Antal added.

Alacer expects to fund most, if not all of the POX project construction costs by using existing cash and future cash flows from the high-margin, low-cost oxide heap leach operations at Çöpler.

The Toronto-based firm last month reported a record third quarter, lifting gold output to 81 059 oz, up 19% on its performance in the second quarter. Attributable gold production for the quarter was 64 847 oz.