i-80 Gold advances on Nevada drilling news
i-80 Gold Corp. [IAU-TSXV] on Tuesday announced the best intercept reported to date from drilling at the South Pacific Zone (SPZ) at its Granite Creek project in Nevada.
The wholly-owned Granite Creek is an advanced exploration project located on the Getchell Trend, 43 kilometres northwest of Winnemucca. Since 1980, the property has produced nearly one million ounces of gold, primarily from the CX, Mag, and Range Front Zones.
Assay results released Tuesday are from one exploration drill hole. Key intercepts include 16.3 g/t gold over 15.7 metres and an additional 33.7 g/t gold over 3.7 metres.
i-Gold shares advanced on the news, rising 4.0% or 13 cents to $3.35 on volume of 293,110. The shares are currently trading in a 52-week range of $4.03 and $2.33.
i-80 Gold is in the process of developing multiple mining operations to achieve its objective of building a Nevada-focused mining company with a goal of ultimately producing more than 500,000 ounces of gold annually. It recently announced initial gold sales from heap leach operations at its Lone Tree and Ruby Hill sites.
The company was spun out by Premier Gold Mines after Premier was acquired by Equinox Gold Corp. [EQX-TSXV, EQXGF-OTC] in an all-stock deal worth $612 million. i80 Gold acquired the Granite Creek, Lone Tree and Ruby Hill properties to become one of the largest holders of gold and silver resources in Nevada.
Importantly, the company secured the ability to process all types of gold mineralization, including refractory gold-bearing mineralization, through the acquisition of the Lone Tree processing complex and also through interim processing arrangements with Nevada Gold Mines (a joint venture owned by Barrick Gold Corp. [ABX-TSX, GOLD-NYSE], Newmont Corp., [NGT-TSX, NEM-NYSE]), that provide the company with the flexibility to process material from any of the three planned underground operations until the Lone Tree autoclave is restarted.
Processing of refractory mineralization remains one of the biggest barriers to entry in Nevada and i-80 is currently one of only three companies with this capability.
To execute its “Hub and Spoke” development plan, i-80 has said it plans to construct four new mining operations over the next three years, complete multiple large-scale drill programs, advance permitting, building a tier-one exploration, development and mining operations team and restart the Lone Tree autoclave.
The company said Lone Tree will be the “Hub” of i-80s Nevada operations as the central processing facility, operations office, assay lab and warehouse for all sites. Mineralization from Granite Creek, Ruby Hill and McCoy-Cove will feed the Lone Tree Autoclave, once it is restarted.
Results released on Tuesday are the assays from the final hole of 16 holes drilled in the SPZ at Granite Creek during the 2021 Phase 1.0 drilling program that was focused on delineating mineralization.
The SPZ is the target of an ongoing 2022 drill campaign which is focused on step out drilling to expand mineralization along strike and at depth near Granite Creek’s existing underground workings.