Development Projects
The Eastern Dragon gold-silver project is located in Heilongjiang Province, China. It will be an open pit and underground mine. Construction activities resumed at the Eastern Dragon project in November 2010 and are ongoing. Production is anticipated to begin in Q3 2012.
The Olympias polymetallic project is located 8 km north of the operating Stratoni mine in northern Greece. The project consists of a polymetallic massive sulphide deposit. We received approval of the Technical Study of the Olympias mine from the Ministry of Environment and Climate Change (MoE) in March 2012.
Olympias has an expected mine life of 22 years (based on P&P Reserves) and will operate in three phases. Phase I consists of processing the existing 2.4 million tonnes of surface tailings that will commence in Q3 2012, as well as refurbishment of the underground mine. Eldorado expects to process approximately 320,000 tonnes of tailings during 2012, which will result in the production of approximately 35,000 tonnes of a pyrite concentrate containing 20.0 g/t gold.
The Skouries gold-copper project is located in the Chalkidiki peninsula, Northern Greece, 100 km east of Thessaloniki and 35 km by road from the Stratoni port. Skouries is a high value porphyry deposit that forms a near-vertical pipe. The project benefits from a simple metallurgical process and will produce clean Cu-Au concentrate via flotation as well as dore from a gravity circuit.
We received approval of the Technical Study of the Skouries Project from the MoE in March 2012. Local contractors are now on site preparing for the start of construction this quarter. Skouries has an expected mine life of 27 years (based on P&P Reserves) and will operate in two phases. Phase I consists of open-pit mining at a rate of ~8.0 million tonnes per annum commencing in 2015.
The Perama Hill gold project in Greece is in permitting stages. Our application was accepted into the Fast Track Process in June 2011 and we received approval for the Preliminary Environmental Impact Assessment of Perama Hill in February 2012. On March 30, 2012 the Company submitted the Environmental Impact Study (EIS) for Perama to the MoE. We anticipate, in accordance with the Fast Track law, to receive final approvals in Q4 2012.
The Certej epithermal gold/silver project is located in the Golden Quadrilateral area of the Apuseni Mountains of Transylvania in Western Romania, 12 km from the regional town of Deva. Eldorado owns 80% of the project. The deposit extends from surface and will be mined by open pit methods. Certej has an expected mine life of 12 years (based on P&P Reserves) with mining beginning in the Main Zone in 2015 and transitioning to the West Zone by 2021.
The Tocantinzinho (TZ) gold project is located in the prolific Tapajos district in northern Brazil. We filed a positive NI 43-101 compliant Technical Report for TZ in May 2011 and plan to complete a Feasibility Study in Q3 2012. We expect to receive approval of the Environmental Impact Assessment in Q4 2012, and will then make a construction decision.
Last update: April 12, 2012.
