Name of the Project
Star-Orion South diamond project.

Location
The project is situated in the Fort à la Corne diamond district of central Saskatchewan, Canada.

Client
Star Diamond Corp.

Project Description
A preliminary economic assessment (PEA) has determined that an estimated 66-million carats of diamonds could be recovered from a surface mine over a 34-year life-of-mine.

The PEA envisages the development of two openpits, initially Orion South, followed by Star, using conventional openpit methods.

Conventional hydraulic excavators and haul trucks create a starting “key” for three bucket wheel excavators (BWEs) to remove the sand and clay overburden from the kimberlite. Conveyor belts will transfer the sand and clay from the BWEs to the nearby overburden waste area. The exposed kimberlite will be lightly blasted and conventional hydraulic shovels will load the rock into trucks. These trucks will transfer the rock to an in-pit feeder and the kimberlite delivered to the processing plant using a conveyor belt.

The processing facility will have the capacity to process 45 000 t/d of kimberlite using autogenous milling, followed by screening, X-ray transmission diamond recovery and dense-media separation of heavy mineral concentrate.

The recovery section will use X-ray technology, with grease as the scavenging technology to recover the low-luminescence diamonds. The diamonds will be sorted into parcels in the on-site sorting facility.

Potential Job Creation
Not stated.

Net Present Value/Internal Rate of Return
The project has an after-tax net present value, at a 7% discount rate, of $2-billion and an internal rate of return of 19%, with a payback of 3.5 years after the start of construction.

Value
Preproduction capital expenditure is estimated $1.41-billion.

Duration
Not stated.

Latest Developments
None stated.

Key Contracts and Suppliers
SGS Canada; DRA Americas and ENGCOMP Engineering and Computing Professionals (PEA).

On Budget and on Time?
Too early to state.

Contact Details for Project Information
Star Diamond Corp, tel +1 306 664 2202 or email stardiamondcorp@stardiamondcorp.com.