NYSE American-listed Paramount Gold Nevada has submitted its plan of operation to the federal Bureau of Land Management (BLM), outlining its plans to build and operate the proposed Grassy Mountain underground gold mine, in Oregon.
The project’s processing facilities and tailings storage would be located on federal land.
Over the next 30 days, the BLM will review the plan for completeness and provide the company with comments, if any. Once the application is deemed complete, a notice of intent would be filed in the federal register, initiating the environmental impact statement process under the National Environmental Policy Act.
The process is expected to take 12 months to be completed.
“Submitting the plan of operation kicks off the final phase in the permitting process, bringing us another step closer to having all the regulatory approvals to operate Grassy Mountain,” said Paramount president and COO Glen Van Treek.
Paramount has already received all county permits for the mine.
The 2018 prefeasibility study outlined a robust case for the proposed Grassy Mountain project, with the base case projecting an after-tax internal rate of return of 28% at $1 300/oz of gold and the estimated net present value exceeding $87-million at a 5% discount rate.
The mine will produce about 47 000 oz of gold and 50 000 oz of silver for 7.25 years.
The gold/silver project consists of about 11 000 acres located on private and BLM land in Malheur county.