Vannessa confirms Crucitas rights, Glencair nixes Bellavista deal

Vannessa Ventures (VVV-T) has confirmed that the government of Costa Rica will honour the company’s existing rights to the Crucitas gold project.

A recent decree by Costa Rica’s newly elected President Abel Pacheco banning open pit mining had cast a shadow over the project’s future.

The Vancouver-based junior says it will,” work diligently to support the Government’s goal to protect the environment and at the same time, safeguard the tremendous potential economic benefit for the country and its people.”

The proposed processing system at Crucitas will be a closed cyanide circuit and will target only a small portion of the project’s resource; the majority of the gold will be recovered by gravity. A cyanide destruction circuit, using proven INCO SO(2)-air technology, will be incorporated.

Vannessa will also set up a monitoring system, which will include representatives from government, local communities and environmental groups.

Vannessa was granted an exploitation permit for the near-surface gold-bearing saprolite material at Crucitas earlier this year. Initially, the company plans to mine the near-surface resource at the annual rate of 80,000 oz. The construction cost of this initial phase is pegged at US$27 million.

The near-surface measured and indicated resource is estimated at 10.3 million tonnes grading 2.2 grams gold per tonne. The inferred resource is about 3 million tonnes at 1.9 grams gold. All the resources are based on a cutoff grade of 0.8 gram gold per tonne.

Crucitas also hosts a gold-bearing hard-rock resource, bringing the total measured and indicated gold resource to 29.6 million tonnes grading 1.5 grams gold and 3.4 grams silver, and the total inferred resource to 10.1 million tonnes of 1.6 grams gold and 2.9 grams silver.

An additional inferred resource 12 km to the southeast, at the Conchudita concession, is pegged at 3.2 million tonnes of 4.6 grams gold.

Elsewhere in Costa Rica, Glencairn Explorations (GLJ-V) has decided not to proceed with the acquisition of Wheaton River Minerals‘ (WRM-T) Bellavista gold project.

Just last week, Glencairn said that the decree did not appear to affect the low-grade gold deposit, and that it would confirm that rights to the mine would be maintained before proceeding with the purchase.

The project received all necessary environmental approvals in Feb. 2001.

Glencairn was to acquire the project by issuing 4 million shares and paying $500,000 in cash. Also under the deal, Wheaton would be granted a three-year option to buy 4 million Glencairn shares at 60 apiece. It would also have an option to buy up to another 2 million shares at $1 each for three years.

In the end, Wheaton would be left with a 21.2% stake in Glencairn. That would climb to 40.3% on Wheaton exercising all of its options.

Bellavista, which centres on an epithermal gold-silver deposit, hosts 11.2 million tonnes grading 1.54 grams gold per tonne. This is sufficient to yield 60,000 oz. annually over more than seven years at a total operating cost of US$179 per oz. Capital costs are pegged at US$28 million.