Scotgold progresses Cononish, expands geoscience team

The AIM-traded firm also announced the expansion of its geoscience team, which it said would be important both for the success of the Cononish Mine and the Grampian exploration project.

At Cononish, it said that both underground development activities and the critical path plant construction activities had progressed well, while Covid-19 safety protocols had been fully implemented.

The underground development had benefited from the arrival of the previously-announced standby ST2G scooptram on site, with the first of the two new T1D drill rigs currently in transit.

With the completion of the critical platform earthworks, concrete works and placement of major equipment items, plant construction was now focussed on the building structure, to be followed by the installation and connections of pumps, drives, piping and electrics, and ultimately commissioning.

First gold was now scheduled to occur by 30 November, the board confirmed.

Looking at its geoscience team, Scotgold said the first appointment was of Dr Simon Dominy as group manager of resources and reserves.

It said Dr Dominy is a mining geologist-engineer with more than 25 years of practical and management experience in project development, value generation and operational optimisation.

Secondly, David Catterall was appointed as exploration consultant to advise on the Grampian Project.

The board said Catterall is a SACNASP-registered professional exploration geologist with more than 30 years of experience in the resource sector, with an emphasis on structural mapping and interpretation, geochemistry and geophysics.

“The depth of our geological understanding of both Cononish and the Dalradian belt is obviously key to our long-term success and with the appointments made today, we are building a world class geoscience team to unlock the fantastic potential of this whole area and our significant land holdings in particular,” said chief executive officer Richard Gray.

“Our objective is to use the cash flow generative platform which Cononish is expected to provide to build a highly profitable, low risk gold mining company operating in stable jurisdictions.

“With this in mind, I am confident both Simon and David will prove invaluable to Scotgold and I look forward to providing further updates on our progress.”