Kedrovka

Kedrovka is a gold mine operating in the northeast of the Republic of Buryatia. The asset is steeped in history, being operated by LLC Prospector’s crew Zapadnaya since 1996.

The deposit is located by the southern spurs of Uzhno-Muysky range, 100km from the settlement Taksimo, which possesses favourable transportation conditions including railway station and airport; company’s central office and operation base are also located here.

The main commercial mineralisation is represented by gold bearing quartz veins and veinlet-disseminated zones. There were more than 35 veins identified at the deposit, and there is very little knowledge about many of them. As a result of exploration activities balance reserves were identified on 8 veins.

The mine operates all year round. Power is supplied using 110 kW HV line, which was put into service in 2014.

Ore is mined in underground areas of Osinovaya, Shamanskiye, Barguzinskaya-1 and Barguzinskaya-2 veins using scraper equipment and underground motor transport. Ore is hauled to the processing plant by heavy vehicles-dumpers.

Mined ore is processed at the plant which was built in 1997 and underwent technical upgrade in 2016-17. A process flow diagram involves gravity recovery followed by cyanidation of middlings and gravity tailings; total gold recovery amounts to 95 %. Also, as of 2009, gravity tailings, being ore derivative product of past years, go through a secondary enrichment. After the processing plant was reconstructed in 2016-17, its total capacity amounted to 300,000 tpa and gold production to 1300-1400 kg per annum.

In the near future, it is planned to build heap leaching facility to be able to process concurrently mined low-grade ore as well as ore which is localized in quartz metasomatites zones.

Kedrovka has a significant potential on reserves increment both on operated veins and those going through an exploration stage. This is confirmed by exploration activity results of the past years: for the period of 2008-2016 gold reserves increment amounted to over 12t.