The Scottish Cononish gold mine will start production in 2014 – but it’s only 0.03% of world mine supply

As we’ve talked about before, as the price of gold keeps rising more and more new players  will come into the gold space using various methods of recovery techniques.

Scotgold, the owners of the Cononish gold mine have just announced that their gold mine based in Loch Lomond national park scotland will start producing gold in 2014. From the BBC:

The mining company said it was “very encouraged” by the results of drilling in the western section of the Cononish mine near Tyndrum.

A total of 14 holes were drilled to help form the basis of a mining plan.

The final results will be included in a report by mining consultants Snowden.

Drilling has also started in the eastern section of the mine, with a further five holes planned.Scotgold said it anticipated the report to be completed early next year, enabling mining to begin in the second quarter of 2013.

The first gold production is expected in early 2014.

So just how much gold is potentially in the Scottish gold mine? From Scotgold’s website:

Conon­ish has the poten­tial to be an eco­nomic, small, high-grade, nar­row vein under­ground min­ing oper­a­tion pro­duc­ing between 20,000 to 30,000 ounces of gold per annum. There is some poten­tial for increased gold grade locally at Conon­ish, due to a high nugget effect and an infor­ma­tion effect due to sparse drilling in areas of the Conon­ish Vein. There is some poten­tial for increased gold grade locally at Conon­ish, due to a high nugget effect and an infor­ma­tion effect due to sparse drilling in areas of the Conon­ish Vein.

At today’s price of around £1100 per ounce that adds up to about £33m in gold per year. However don’t expect this new supply coming on to the market in 2014 to have any dramatic affect on the gold price.

30,000 ounces per year is a little under 1 ton per year. To put that into perspective the world’s gold supply from mines according to the GFMS survey is about 3000 tons.

Or to put that another way, the mine in Scotland will be producing about 0.03% of the worlds total mined gold per year.

Related posts:

1. Mine production up at Fresnillo – but scrap still holds the key for 2011
2. UK’s Last Working Gold Mine Needs Investors
3. Australian Mine Sees Output Soar
4. Further delay for Scots gold mine
5. What will happen to Gold Supply if Demand is very high?

Link to this article: : http://www.goldmadesimplenews.com/mining/the-scottish-cononish-gold-mine-will-start-production-in-2014-but-its-only-0-03-of-world-mine-supply-8288/

Posted by Kate Gerbich on Oct 8 2012. Filed under Mining. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.