Name: Tritton Copper Operations.
Location: The Tritton Copper Operations are located near the town of Nyngan, in central New South Wales, Australia.
Mine Owner/s: Aeris Resources.
Brief Description: The Tritton Copper Operations comprise the Tritton underground mine and the Murrawombie underground mine. Murrawombie is the secondary production source for the Tritton Copper Operations.
Ore production from both mines is treated at the Tritton processing plant.
Brief History: Mining of the Tritton orebody started in 2004, with the development of an access decline and the construction of a sulphide ore processing plant.
The development of Murrawombie started in 2016 and the mine reached full production rates in 2018.
Primary Metals/Minerals: Copper.
Secondary Metals/Minerals: Gold and silver.
Geology/Mineralisation: The Tritton Copper Operations area is host to a cluster of deposits. Mineralisation across the deposits are hosted within Ordovician turbidite sequences within the Lachlan fold belt.
The deposits are characterised by massive to semimassive pyrite and chalcopyrite sulphide deposits. Deposit geometries are characterised as tabular systems.
Mineralised assemblages are dominated by pyrite with lesser chalcopyrite, gold and silver concentrations. Primary copper mineralisation occurs as banded and stringer chalcopyrite within pyritic rich units.
Reserves: Total proven and probable reserves at the Triton underground mine as at June 2020, were estimated at 2.2-million tonnes grading 1.6% copper, 0.1 g/t gold and 4.5 g/t silver.
The Murrawombie deposit has separate ore reserve estimates for underground mining and openpit mining.
Total proven and probable reserves at the Murrawombie underground mine as at June 2020, were estimated at 1.1-million tonnes grading 1.7% copper 0.4 g/t gold and 8.1 g/t silver.
Total proven and probable reserves at the Murrawombie openpit mine as at June 2020, were estimated 1.6-million tonnes grading 0.9% copper, 0.1 g/t gold and 2.8 g/t silver.
Resources: Total measured and indicated resources at Triton underground mine as at June 2020, were estimated at 7.1-million tonnes grading 1.4% copper, 0.1 g/t gold and 4 g/t silver. Total recoverable measured and indicated resources in Triton pillars were estimated at 140 000 t grading 2.2% copper, 0.3 g/t gold and 10.7 g/t silver.
Total mineral resources at the Murrawombie mine as June 2020, were estimated at 5.1-million tonnes grading 1.5% copper, 0.3 g/t gold and 5 g/t silver.
Mining Method: At the Tritton deposit, the method is sublevel open stoping with cemented paste fill.
At the Murrawombie deposit, the ore is currently extracted using underground bench stopes and small open stopes with cemented rockfill. Future mining of the Murrawombie deposit will be openpit, as the final extraction stage.
Major Infrastructure and Equipment: Ore is processed at the Triton Copper Operations’ 1.8-million-tonne-a-year processing plant.
Prospects: There are four additional mine projects scheduled for future production, which, together with the Tritton and Murrawombie mines, form the current life-of-mine plan. These projects will supplement and then replace production from Tritton and Murrawombie as the latter are exhausted.
Contact Details:
Aeris Resources
Tel +61 7 3034 6200
Email info@aerisresources.com.au