Newcrest Mining said Tuesday it has resumed over the weekend mining at the Kencana underground mine, part of its 75%-owned Gosowong gold project on the Halmahera Island in Indonesia's North Maluku province, following a suspension of more than four months.
The leading Australian gold producer halted all mining operations at Gosowong after a geotechnical event occurred at the project's Kencana underground mine on February 8 this year. During the period of suspension, technical studies and rehabilitation work were undertaken at both Kencana and Gosowong's Toguraci underground mine and Newcrest only processed some low grade stockpiled material.
The Gosowong project has a 800,000 mt/year processing plant comprising a primary jaw crusher followed by a semi-autogenous grinding mill and ball mill circuit, and a Vertimill circuit.
Newcrest first recommenced mining at the Toguraci mine on April 12. Commenting on the operation of Kencana and Toguraci, the gold miner plans to continue ramping up the two mines, with full production not expected for at least two months, it said in a statement.
The Sydney-listed gold producer remained confident of meeting the group's consolidated production guidance of 2.4 million-2.6 million oz for the financial year ending June 30, 2016, projected in its March quarterly report released in late April.
Gosowong's production for financial year 2015-16 (July-June), however, is expected to be around the bottom end of its guidance range of 195,000-235,000 oz, it noted, an average 8.6% of the company's consolidated forecast.
Newcrest lowered Gosowong's gold output target by an average 33.8% in late April. Prior to the operation hiccups in the past few months, the company had previously expected Gosowong to produce 300,000-350,000 oz of gold in FY 2015-16, accounting for about one-tenth of Newcrest's anticipated 2.4 million-2.6 million oz overall output.
In the nine months ended March 31, the Gosowong project produced 179,819 oz of gold, a 14.1% decline from a year earlier. It contributed 9.7% of Newcrest's consolidated output of 1.84 million oz between July 2015 and March 2016.
