AXG - Antipodes Gold [formerly GEL - Glass Earth]

[elZorro]

Publicly available information on the McAdies regional council permits that were approved by ORC staff and presented to the consents committee follow (stripped down version). These show that Glass Earth has permission to obtain up to 10 litres/sec of water from its own bore(s), and will discharge into a treatment pond and holding ponds. The approximate location of the site is about 1km from the mapped end of German Hill Road.

REPORT from Otago Regional Council (ORC)
Document Id: A158365
Report No: 2009/1384
Prepared For: Consents Committee
Prepared By: Julene Ludlow, Manager Resource Management Administration
Date: 3 November 2009
Subject: Resource Management Administration Report from Saturday 26th
September 2009 to Friday 30 October 2009 inclusive
__________________________________________________ ___________________
1. Project E.1 – Resource Consent Application Processing
40 new applications, 1 transfer of site and 3 variations to conditions were received during this period. The types of applications received are shown in Appendix 1. Applications for land use consents to drill a bore made up the majority of new applications received.

1.3 Consents Decided
The table of consents decided between Saturday 26th September 2009 to Friday 30 October is attached as Appendix 2. There were a total of 24 consents decided; none were either limited notified or publicly notified. In the case of water take decisions, the rates of take for those decided consents are included in Appendix 3.

Appendix 2 (includes)

2009.169 23/10/2009
Mathew Bell Staff Panel
[Water Permit] - Under Take
Glass Earth (New Zealand) Limited
To take groundwater water for non-consumptive use for the purpose of operating a gold recovery plant. Location: Approximately 2.7 kilometres southeast of the intersection of Flannery Road and Jones Road, Poolburn, Central Otago

2009.170 20/10/2009
Mathew Bell Staff Panel
[Discharge Permit] - Water
Glass Earth (New Zealand) Limited
To discharge water containing sediment to water in a processing pond and storage ponds for the purpose of operating a gold recovery plant. Location: Approximately 2.7 kilometres southeast of the intersection of Flannery Road and Jones Road, Poolburn, Central Otago

2009.171 23/10/2009
Mathew Bell Staff Panel
[Land Use Permit] - Bores
Glass Earth (New Zealand) Limited
To construct up to three bores for the purpose of accessing groundwater. Location: Approximately 2.7 kilometres southeast of the intersection of Flannery Rd and Jones Rd, Poolburn, Central Otago

Appendix 3
Water Take decisions made between 26 September and 30 October 2009
Consent Number Holder Rate (l/s)
2006.402 Borst Holdings Limited 40
2009.169 Glass Earth (New Zealand) Limited 10
2009.219 Watson I S Watson P M 5
2009.296 Aitkens Folly Vineyard Limited 1.5
2009.309 Highground Land Company Limited 0.15

This looks like a very tidy self-contained setup, and GEL are by no means the biggest possible water user in this batch of consents.

[elZorro]

Aotea, you've got me interested in finding out what size of operation is needed for those large mining turnover days..

Westland District Council site:

Ross, located 15 minutes south of Hokitika, was settled in 1865 mainly as a gold mining town which at its peak had a population of about 2,500 people drawn by the lure of gold as well as numerous hotels to service the thirsty miners. Today the town has a resident population of 291 people and has become a popular base for people working in Hokitika and Greymouth as well as staff employed by Birchfield Mining who operate a large gold mining operation in the area.

During spring, the main street of Ross, which is also the State Highway, is lined with blossom trees in flower which were planted by the Community Association.

In 1909, two miners working in Jones Creek close to the township unearthed a gold nugget weighing around 3.1 kg which was then and still is the largest found in New Zealand. It was christened “The Honourable Roddy Nugget” after the then Minister of Mines, Roderick McKenzie. The nugget was used as a doorstop at a local hotel for many years before being raffled to raise money to build the local hospital. This raffle was the start of New Zealand’s first Golden Kiwi Lottery. In 1911 the nugget was gifted to King George V as a coronation gift and was sadly melted down and gilded on a tea set.

Ross is bordered by the Totara and Mikonui Rivers to the North and South and the Southern Alps and Tasman Sea to the east and west. It is a paradise for anyone with a love or yearn to explore the outdoors. Walks close to Ross include the old Railway walk, which is currently being converted into a cycle way from Hokitika, or the Water Race through rainforest which also takes in a historic cemetery, an old miners hut and tunnels as well as spectacular views of the coastline and valley. There is excellent trout fishing and white baiting in the rivers close by while the surfcasting from the Ross beach is among the best on the West Coast.

The Ross Goldfields Information and Heritage Centre, which is operated by the local community, has a great shop showcasing local art, crafts, souvenirs and gifts as well the local history of the area. Visitors can also try their hand at panning for gold while staff are always happy to help with accommodation and other travel enquiries as well as the many attractions in the area. The town has two hotels, bed and breakfast outlets as well as backpacker accommodation and campsites.

Ross Goldfields Information & Heritage Centre
Ph 03 755 4077 or email rossgoldfields@netaccess.co.nz for more information on accommodation, tours, walks and activities.
www.ross.org.nz

The Grey River dredge operated by Allan Birchfield can run 24 hrs a day and process 187,000 tonnes of gravel a week. At Ross, Evan Birchfield's operation appears to be a fixed system:

Minerals West Coast Annual Forum, Hokitika 2 July 2008

Similar to previous years the day’s proceedings commenced with the Trust's AGM, followed by a morning session concentrating on national issues that affect the Coast, and an afternoon session of updates of major developments and topical issues within the Coast. (etc).

..The theme for this year’s Forum was Mining on the West Coast –its recent evolution. Three morning speakers Don Elder, Damien O’Connor and Chris Auchinvole were followed by updates form Pike River Coal (Peter Whittall), Oceana Gold (Gareth Thomas and Melanie Rosak) and Department of Conservation (Mike Slater) The afternoon presentations were followed by a wet and windy field excursion to Birchfield Ross Minerals operations in Ross.

Birchfield’s maintain the only fixed plant alluvial gold operation on the Coast . Commissioning of a new plant, some two kilometres south of their existing now decommissioned plant is currently underway, and it was to here that the group was safely escorted by a retired WWII military tank. Evan Birchfield explained the plant had ‘yet to produce’ any gold but all were hopeful. The mining process and the considerable extent of rehab work, now with good grass cover and carrying stock, was a testament to how integrating land development with mining provides multiple benefits.

Special thanks to Evan for hosting the field trip and the efforts he went to ensuring we were not ‘at risk’ from any insurgents.

I did some quick calcs: at 5g gold/tonne, this operation would need to process 6,200 tonne a day if their return gross was (say) NZ$1000 per ounce. That looks to be about a third of the big dredge's capability, and I guess they use earthmovers like Newmont does at Waihi. You might have more details though, Aotea.

Newmont Waihi's site states their maximum processing ability is 3,500 tonne of ore/day, at average 3.3g/tonne gold (main pit), so 379 oz/day at best..but the extended work in the pit may yield 800,000 oz gold. Their max water take was/is 230 litres/sec.

[elZorro]

Anytime now we should see a press release detailing how the gold recovery and bulk testing is going . Meanwhile, we have to guess:

It's quite hard to put together, but here is the scant information we have on GEG (GEL's) mining equipment:

(A) 1x 40 tonne floating GRU, refurbished and rewired, part owned with Dunstan Mining Ltd, currently leased out to L&M Mining, from Nov 2009. Working in a pond at Earnscleugh, unknown results.

According to CHFIR, it handles 75 cu mtr/hr, say 150 tonne of gravel per hour. If it was run perfectly for 24hrs a day, with ore at 5g gold/tonne, it could recover 580oz a day, worth about NZ$580,000 gross/day.

I assume this beauty will end up at one of the GEL permits in the near term..

(B)The new Ophir pilot plant with crushing and gravity separation handles 5-7 tonnes/hr, so by comparison can yield 27oz/24hrs at best, and the level of gold over there is apparently between 3g and 4g/tonne.

(C)Mention is made that if all goes well at Ophir, the JV (GEL&Ophir Gold) will construct a 40 tonne/hr plant. This could yield up to 125oz per 24 hr shift at 4g gold/tonne.

(D)At McAdies, another plant is in use. It's not much smaller than the 40 tonne GRU (A) which was earmarked for this site. Maybe it's about 100 tonne/hr, so capable of 386oz per 24 hrs. It's running costs would be higher I guess.

Anyway, we're all quite keen on hearing about these machines..

[elZorro]

Here's a bit more about the first GRU: the full article I think.

Ready to mine for bullion

The Southland Times, Sep 17, 2009 | by John Edens

THE plant for an Earnscleugh goldmine is expected to go on-site next month.

L&M Mining began a seven-year, $165 million goldmining operation on the Fraser River bed in June.

Dunstan Mining managing director Bob Kilgour is in charge of the plant, leased to L&M on a renewable contract.

Mr Kilgour and his team spent the last four months rebuilding the machine, which is in pieces in a yard off Boundary Rd, Alexandra.

The 40-tonne plant, valued at about $500,000, was jointly bought by Dunstan Mining and Glass Earth Gold.

They stripped it down, sanded the 10-year-old kit, cleaned and welded, Mr Kilgour said.

Three 106cm jigs would sieve alluvial gravel at a rate of up to 100 cubic metres a second to extract gold, he said.

Power for the diesel plant would be supplied by a separate 120kW generator.

Next month, a crane would lift the plant on to a transporter before it is placed on pontoons at Earnscleugh and floated over the mine site.

--------------------
The Southland Times, Copyright of Fairfax New Zealand Limited 2009, All rights reserved.
Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning Company. All rights Reserved.

I'm not a mining engineer, but I think there may be some technical errors in this article. Maybe the rig can handle 100 cubic metres of gravel an hour..and I guess the unit will be powered by a 120kW diesel genset.

The renewable contract (mentioned above) may mean GEL will not be able to do more than reap a portion of lease fees from this gear until the contract is up, I hope it's worthwhile.

[elZorro]

Might have posted this earlier, but this was the intention of L&M in June 2009.

L&M starts up Earnscleugh alluvial goldmine in central Otago.

12 June 2009 - Private mining and energy company L&M Group has begun work on its Earnscleugh alluvial gold mine project across the Clutha River from Alexandra in Central Otago.

L&M exploration manager David Manhire, of Christchurch, said high gold prices had encouraged the company to activate its Earnscleugh project, which is estimated to contain 110,000 oz of gold and is expected to run for at least seven years.

The L&M Group’s focus on alluvial gold mining in the 1980’s and 1990’s switched in the past decade to lignite, coal seam gas, and recently Buller and north Waikato coal.

Mr Manhire said the size of the Earnscleugh mine had been scaled down to 150 hectares (ha) from an earlier plan to mine 255 ha as granted by the 2001 resource consents in 2001. All appeals against the consents were cleared in mid-2004.

He said gold mining subsidiary L&M Mining held two mining permits MP 41005 covering 81 ha and the much larger MP 41462 covering 919 ha. Both are held in the name of Mintago Investments Ltd.

The project will focus on the smaller of the two permits and the area nearby on the eastern side of the Fraser River, which will now not be diverted. The Fraser runs parallel to the Clutha and through MP 41462 before joining the Clutha upstream from Alexandra.

Mr Manhire said the mine was virgin ground and had not been mined by the large Earnscleugh dredges that mined the area 100 years ago.

Some 1,300 holes were drilled to test gold grades over the new mine area in the 1980s and 1990s before the mining permit was granted.

The Earnscleugh mine will be operated by a contracting team and have two stages, Mr Manhire said. The first stage will be a small scale mine that is expected to begin mining in July.

In the second stage a larger floating gold recovery plant currently stored at L&M’s closed Waikaka mine near Gore, will be brought to Earnscleugh.

Sources: L&M Mining and Lindsay Clark

Multiply 110,000oz by NZ $1500 per ounce and you get $165 million, that's the figure the Southland Times used for the project. So that doesn't take into account costs or wholesale value, it's the retail value of the gold that should be recovered. Still, not a bad living by the look of it.

110,000 oz is 3,410kg of gold over seven years, and if working for 240 days/year, they hope to recover an average of 2kg of gold a day, so they need to process perhaps 400 tonnes of gold-bearing gravel each day.

Without even going 24 hrs, you could do that at 50 tonne/hr in an 8 hr shift. What's a bit disturbing, is that GEL's refurbed GRU can handle 150 to perhaps 200 tonne/hr, but it will need loading by digger(s).

Will L&M still want to bring in their second stage big gear with a bucket dredge?

[elZorro]

Found this on a BusinessWeek page for GEL: probably it was announced on a trading day, I missed it.

Key developments for GLASS EARTH GOLD LTD (GEL)
Glass Earth Gold Limited, Special/Extraordinary Shareholders Meeting, Feb 24, 2010

01/15/2010

Glass Earth Gold Limited, Special/Extraordinary Shareholders Meeting, Feb 24, 2010, at 10:00 US Pacific Time. Location: Suite 1750 – 1185 West Georgia Street, Vancouver B.C. V6E 4E6,Canada. Agenda: To consider the issued share capital of the company be altered by consolidating all of the 157,702,633 issued common shares without par value into 31,540,526 issued common shares without par value, on the basis that every 5 common shares be consolidated into 1 common share without par value, or on such lesser basis as may be approved by the board of directors and the TSX Venture Exchange; and to transact such further or other business as may properly come before the meeting and any adjournments thereof .

As a relative newbie, what does this mean for us?

[Silverlight]

I can't see that on the NZX nor TSX website.

In the US and most likely Canada listed companies get charged listing fees on the amount of shares they have on issue, not the market cap of the company.

So a share consolidation on the TSX may be a way of cost cutting, the annual listing fees that Glass Earth gets charged.

They may do the same here, but NZX don't seem to show a record of it.

Additionally NZX and ASX both only charge their annual listing fees based on market cap, so there would be no benefit to Glass Earth doing a consolidation here.

[Canstock]

Check out my comments on Stockhouse.

[elZorro]

Just relaying a private message from Canstock (his post not set up by admin yet):

From Canstock, Ontario:
Reverse splits rarely benefit the little guy. If we are trading at 5 cents one day, then the reverse split, we will be trading at 25 cents the next day, after the RS. Without great news we will drift back down to 5 cents, but now we only have 20% of our original shares. I understand why they have to do it, but it still sucks for us. It will be easier for them to raise money with less shares outstanding. The unfulfilled private placement was likely the catalyst for this.

I don't think the share price will drift back, Canstock, we have just seen it firming up here in NZ, in anticipation of the placer results and cashflow improvements. There was some mention that not all of the CAN$500k had turned up earlier on, sounded like that was temporary.

I'm taking a longer-term view on GEL (being an optimist) and I consider that the money spent on R&D (exploration) will come out the other end - if everyone does their job. That means (to me) the ordinary shares are still worth NZ25c, and I picked up some bargain GEL shares over the last year or so. While the shares now rest at 7.7c-8c here, there is expectation that the placer cashflow and some firmed-up drilling results for the larger sites will have a positive impact on the share.

I received the paperwork for the Special General Meeting over the weekend. Wellington head office had dated the letter 20th January 2010. As expected, management is keen on the 1 for 5 share deal. I think I'll go along with that.

I can imagine that new investors might be put off by the currently low share price, and without the history and buy-in that the rest of us have, be reluctant to get started. The consolidation might also put GEL back on the map a little. It applies to all shares, in NZ and Canada. The special deals for GEL share purchases at a later date (stock option plan) are also changing in line with the ordinary shares.

[elZorro]

Great, there were some press releases in the weekend:

Glass Earth aiming at higher capacity
ODT: Home » News » Business
By Simon Hartley on Sat, 30 Jan 2010
News: Business

Listed Glass Earth Gold is working towards commissioning a second gold-recovery unit for use at one of its three Ida Valley prospects in Central Otago, where the firm has been recovering alluvial gold for the past five weeks.

It is likely the commissioning can not come quickly enough for Glass Earth.

The exploration company's cash in hand had fallen below $1 million by December last year, the company having spent more than $24 million since dual listing on the Toronto and New Zealand stock exchanges in October 2006, focusing mainly on exploration around Otago.

Creating cash flow from its boutique mining ventures in the Ida Valley and Ophir is crucial to Glass Earth's future, the explorer to date having only posted losses.

Glass Earth chief executive Simon Henderson was upbeat about the consistent but unspecified amount of gold being recovered daily from the McAdies prospect in the Ida Valley.

"I'd like to see the second GRU [gold-recovery unit] start tomorrow. But we're likely to see that happening by the end of February," he said yesterday.

Glass Earth is working with joint venture partner Dunstan Mining in the Ida Valley and is permitted for mining at the McAdies prospect.

The explorer was "almost 95% of the way there" to get mining permits in place for the Gun Club and Nevills prospects in the Ida Valley, Mr Henderson said.

At present there is a 60-80cu m-per-hour gold-recovery unit operating at McAdies, achieving 40cu m per hour, and Mr Henderson hoped a second unit would also have an up to 80cu m-per-hour capacity.

"A lot depends on the ground conditions when it comes to [cu m-per-hour] recoveries," Mr Henderson said.

He has said in the past 2010 would be crunch time for Glass Earth in terms of generating its own cashflow and in December, he forecast the company had enough funds to continue into "early 2010", a forecast which remained unchanged yesterday.

"We're getting gold on a daily basis and are meeting [gold-recovery] expectations," Mr Henderson said of the McAdies prospect, while declining to reveal details.

In early December, Glass Earth posted a third-quarter loss of $218,000, leaving it with working capital of $934,000.

A month earlier, it had completed a private placement in Canada, raising $640,000.

For its previous full year to December 2008, Glass Earth spent $4.1 million on exploration and booked a $1.3 million loss, having a year earlier recorded a $2.68 million loss.

In mid-November last year, Glass Earth recovered a small amount of gold from its other Central Otago prospect, near Ophir, with 50:50 joint venture partner Ophir Gold Ltd, a private company, following bulk-sampling tests under its extended exploration permit.

Unlike the Ida Valley's alluvial (loose) gold deposits, the Ophir deposits are set in hard rock, which is crushed for extraction.

Mr Henderson said the results from bulk testing at Ophir had been sent to a Canadian company to determine the recovery rates and assist in the design of a bigger gold-recovery plant.

Before resuming work at Ophir, Glass Earth also had to determine the size of the gold target, Mr Henderson said.

While the firm had not applied for a mining permit from Crown Minerals for Ophir, the exploration permit allowed for continued bulk testing.

This one shows that McAdie's GRU is running at about 80 tonne gravel/hr, so if at 5g gold/tonne (someone help me out here, is that realistic?) it's nearly 13oz per hour, say $13,000 of gold income every hour!

Note that the placement was fully subscribed, and that the bigger Gun Club mining permit looks close to being approved. It's right next door to some other alluvial miners who are doing well.

And Glass Earth gets a mention today in "shares to watch" over here:

http://www.sharechat.co.nz/article/9...h-hlg-npx.html