Vault Minerals has revealed plans to expand its King of the Hills gold processing facility in Leonora, Western Australia to a whopping six million tonnes per annum throughput.
King of the Hills is already touted to be the largest low-cost and readily scalable facility in the prolific Leonora gold district, setting up the $80 million expansion to make the plant an even more competitive player.
The expansion will see the construction of a new, fit for purpose crushing circuit that is expected to increase throughput by 20 per cent.
Wet plant modifications will also be completed including the upgrade of the classification circuit and the addition of four CIP tanks. Tailings pump capacity, electrowinning capacity, carbon regeneration capacity and associated services will also be upgraded.
The project’s design, scope of work and costing was completed by GR Engineering Services.
The current milling capacity limits production, with a 7.3 million tonne stockpile adjacent to the mill containing approximately 108,000 ounces of gold.
Works on the new facility are set to commence in April 2025 and be completed within 15 months.
The facility is currently fed by Vault’s Leonora mining operations, the King of the Hills and Darlot deposits, which host 6.02 million and 2.24 million ounces respectively, underpinning a 10-year mine life.
The expansion comes at a pivotal time for Vault, as it begins in-mine exploration at King of the Hills and Darlot.
Should Vault’s exploration prove fruitful, the new processing facility will allow the future increase of ore throughput to seven million tonnes per annum.
Vault Minerals, the product of the Red 5-Silver Lake merger in June this year, produced 97,493 ounces of gold during the September quarter across its operations.
Subscribe to the Mining newsletter to get the latest news that matters to Australia’s premier industry.
