TORONTO (miningweekly.com) – The owners of the Pebble copper/gold/molybdenum project, in south-west Alaska, have updated and consolidated the project's mineral resources, which are now estimated at 5,1-billion tons in the measured and indicated categories, grading 0,77% copper-equivalent, and containing 48-billion pounds of copper, 57-million ounces of gold and 2,9-billion pounds of molybdenum.

The project also has inferred mineral resources of 4-billion tons, grading 0,55% copper equivalent and containing 24-billion pounds of copper, 37-million ounces of gold and 1,9-billion pounds of molybdenum.

The resources were calculated at a 0,3% copper-equivalent cutoff.

The deposit was previously split into a near-surface resource for Pebble West and a deeper resource for Pebble East, and this is the first time the entire Pebble deposit has been integrated into one estimate, said Vancouver-based Northern Dystasty Minerals, which owns 50% of the project.

Diversified miner Anglo American owns the balance.

"By virtually any measure -- volumes and grade, continuity of mineralisation, resource confidence, potential for expansion -- Pebble must be considered among the most important mineral deposits in the world," Northern Dynasty president and CEO Ron Thiessen said on Thursday.

"A modern, long-life mine at Pebble could produce one-quarter of America's domestic copper supply for 50-plus years, along with substantial volumes of gold, molybdenum and potentially other metals such as silver, rhenium and palladium.”

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