Scotgold, the company gearing up to build the Cononish mine on the edge of the Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park, said on Monday that it had received a decision notice relating to the planning application for its gold and silver project.

The Aim-listed company’s application for the development of an underground mine with associated infrastructure has been approved and Scotgold said that it was focused on ensuring that the planning obligations and conditions contained in the decision notice were met as soon as possible.

The company reported that it had already made various submissions to the National Parks Planning Authority and that it was in consultation with other interested agencies.

"The issuance of this decision notice is a major milestone towards the commencement of development and ultimate commercial production. We are hopeful that the efforts that have been made in satisfying the conditions and the constructive engagement of the various agencies will result in the commencement of Cononish in the very near future. In parallel with the work to satisfy the conditions, the company has been busy preparing for work on the ground and we look forward to the prospect of actioning these plans," said CEO Richard Gray.

Scotgold’s planning application was for a revision of the extraction and processing operations at Cononish gold mine, originally permitted in 1996 and subsequently in 2012 and 2015.

Scotgold in August 2017 submitted a revised planning approval application based on a two-phased approach. The first phase entails a 3 000 t/m operation and the second phase will double capacity.

In March last year, the company changed the tailings storage facility to a dry stack system. The redesigned tailings management plan will result in dry tailings being ‘stacked’ on site, and landscaped into a number of naturalistic moraine landforms, and not a single large tailings management facility.

The Cononish mine will produce 23 500 oz/y.