The tailings dam at the Baita Plai mine.
JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – Aim-listed miner Vast Resources is aiming to start operations at the Baita Plai polymetallic mine, in Romania, before the end of 2017, the company said on Wednesday, announcing that it had been selected for a mining right.
The holder of the head licence, Baita, has chosen Vast subsidiary African Consolidated Resources to be granted the right to mine at Baita Plai, in the Apuseni mountains of Transylvania.
Vast is awaiting execution of the final association licence, which was subject to due process, including a Ministerial agreement, regulatory approvals from Romania’s National Agency for Mineral Resources and the final negotiations on terms and conditions associated with the licence.
“These steps are intended to be implemented in the shortest possible time to allow the company to commence operations at Baita Plai before the end of 2017,” the company reported.
Vast currently has an 80% interest in the polymetallic underground mine, which was closed in 2013.
Baita Plai is a skarn deposit comprising several veins in calcareous sediments in eight distinct pipes. The company estimates the deposit to contain 1.8-million tonnes of polymetallic ore (gold, silver, copper, zinc, lead, tungsten and molybdenum) at 6% copper equivalent or 10 g/t gold equivalent.
The mine benefits from full infrastructure including underground, surface and processing equipment and an European Union registered and operational tailings facility, but the plant and equipment will require some rehabilitation.
Vast also owns the Manaila polymetallic mine, in northern Romania, and the Pickstone-Peerless gold mine, in Zimbabwe.