GeoProMining Gold intends to operate Sotq gold mine in an underground manner starting from 2025. The Russian company has submitted to Environment Ministry for the preliminary environmental impact assessment of Sotq gold mine open pit and underground mine development project. The second public hearing of the document is scheduled for November 9 at 14:00 in the building of Geghamasar Municipality in Gegharkunik Region.
Under the project, the mine will continue to be developed in an opencast manner until 2025, but the productivity, which currently stands at 1.0 million tons per year, will increase to 1.75 million tons per year. From 2025 the mine will be developed in an underground manner with an annual capacity of 400,000 tons. "This will allow us to continue developing the mine in the current situation," the statement says.
After the Artsakh war in 2020, a part of Sotq gold mine passed to the Azerbaijani side, Anatoly Gogotin, General Director of GeoProMining Gold LLC, said in an interview with Public TV that they will try to prolong the life of the company.
"We have developed a project for the underground works of the mine, which will allow us to plan the development strategy of the mine for 25 years. At the same time, it will allow us to carry out pre-reconnaissance work. We will deal with it first of all, we will try to prolong the life of the enterprise as much as possible. I think we will be able to extend it for 10 to 15 years, it will turn out to be 25 plus 15 years, i. e. 40 years. This is quite a respectable number," Anatoly Gogotin said.
Under GeoProMining Gold, the minimum average gold content in all open-pit mines is 2.3 g/t, and in all underground mines 2.7 g/t. The area of the open pit will be 601,517 thousand m2, the depth of development of the open pit is 390 m.
October 28, 2021 at 14:01