Hot Chili Limited (ASX:HCH) today updated the market about metallurgical testwork undertaken at its Cortadera and San Antonio copper projects in Chile.
Cortadera is shaping up as a globally significant standalone copper-gold project which can utilise the Productora project resources, and leverage from a central processing and combined infrastructure approach along the coastline of Chile.
Cortadera rivals some of the world’s most recent and significant copper-gold discoveries, including SolGold’s Cascabel porphyry copper-gold project in Ecuador and Zijin Mining’s Timok copper-gold project in Serbia.
Here is a complete list of the best 24 copper-gold drill intercepts worldwide since January 2018 (ordered by width of drill intersection):
Initial results from the most recent work done, were highly encouraging.
Rougher sulphide flotation results indicate high copper recoveries and similar crushing/grinding characteristics.
These results allow all of Hot Chili’s coastal copper deposits (Cortadera, Productora and San Antonio) to be combined into one development.
This development will now be known as ‘Costa Fuego’ and it will utilise a single conventional processing facility.
In promising news, initial rougher recoveries suggest that final copper recovery levels into a commercial grade concentrate are likely to be high.
The test work from Cortadera and San Antonio indicates excellent copper recoveries of 89% to +95%.
Importantly, the recoveries are consistent with other leading global copper developments including (Rio Tinto’s Winu and SolGold’s Cascabel project.
Optimised commercial concentrate grade estimation will be determined following the completion of grind size optimisation, cleaner flotation and locked-cycle test work.
These first results provide a solid foundation from which to carry out further optimisation of the metallurgical flowsheet for life-of-mine ore source supply from the Costa Fuego copper development.
Importantly, there are no deleterious elements present in rougher concentrate, confirming Costa Fuego as a clean-concentrate combined copper development.