Canada Cobalt Works will be shifting through leftover tailings at its Castle Mine property in northeastern Ontario with a plan to recover silver and gold.
The Conquitlam, B.C.-based miner received results from SGS Laboratories that revealed a gravity concentrate from the tailings grading 389 grams per tonne (g/t) silver, 0.63 g/t gold and 0.20 per cent cobalt.
The tailings pile sits 300 metres from the No. 3 Shaft at the historic Castle Mine near the town of Gowganda.
The company said in a March 1 news release that it will be targetting silver and gold through its own proprietary hydrometallurgical process, known as the Re-2OX, to recover cobalt, base metals and precious metals.
A resource estimate or economic analysis of the Castle tailings hasn't yet been prepared.
The company would make an amendment to its advanced exploration permit from the province to carry out this program.
In a broader sense, Canada Cobalt sees great potential to take their technology on the road and clean up mining waste tailings sites across the northeast, while capturing valuable metals.
"We've been a leader on multiple fronts in this district," said Cobalt Canada president-CEO Frank Basa in a statement. "We look forward to working closely with our First Nation partners and the Ministry of Mines to implement a tailings program at Castle that can be a model for similar initiatives in the Gowganda Camp and elsewhere throughout the region from the town of Cobalt to Silver Centre."
The company holds a 28-square-kilometre land package just northeast of town.
The property contains the three shafts of the former Castle Mine, which produced 500 million ounces of silver and 30 million pounds of cobalt in the 1900s.
Last year, the company went underground to drill, which produced high-grade samples of cobalt, nickel, silver and gold. More drilling is underway on a new gold system running 1.5 kilometres east of the mine.
