Inco’s reserves good for 20 years

While the exact use of the reserves, year by year, is not determined more than a year or so in advance — and even then, some flexibility has to be permitted — the company’s production planners know that adequate reser ves are available. They are known as proven and probable reserves, that is, material which, through sampling and assaying, has been deemed economically viable. Advances in mining and processing technology also increase the economic potential of certain mineral deposits which previously may not have been considered mineable because of low grade or extreme depth in the earth’s crust.

Inco’s proven and probable nickel/copper ore reserves at year- end 1988 — 434 million short tons in Canada containing 6.2 million tons of nickel and 3.8 million tons of copper, and 85 million short tons in Indonesia containing 1.6 million tons of nickel — weren’t a lot different from reserves at the end of the previous year. Each year, some reserves are used up and new ones are identified. And so it goes year after year.

But beyond these sampled deposits, geologists know that Inco is sitting on some of the world’s most prominent and best nickel-containing sulphide ore formations. Both the Sudbury Basin in Ontario and the Thompson Nickel Belt in Manitoba are in the geological zone known as the Canadian Shield, one of the foundation plates of the earth’s crust and renowned as one of the world’s most impressive depositories of base metals.

In Indonesia, where the ore, a product of laterization, found on or near the surface, climatic conditions over eons had been conducive to producing the huge, rich deposit of nickel, unmatched almost anywhere in the world. The deposits on the island of Sulawesi have the potential to provide feed material to P.T. Inco for decades upon decades.

Inco’s new ventures in gold is another story. Here, gold reserves keep building with each new find. At the moment, three projects are going forward: Casa Berardi in Quebec province, Mineral Hill in Montana, U.S.A., and Crixas in Goias, Brazil. All told, as of the end of last year, the three properties had delineated, as Inco’s share, about 14 million short tons of drill-indicated ore containing 3.4 million oz of gold. In all, the company is involved in over 100 precious metals ventures and prospects. From Background, an Inco publication.

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