BacTech splits company: gold-focused wing spun off into separate firm.

• Author: Stewart, Nick
• Position: TEMISKAMING

Less than two years into its plan to look at recovering silver from the ample mine tailings in the Cobalt camp, BacTech Mining Corporation is reaching out to potential partners, and restructuring the company to better fund its efforts.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

BacTech, whose proprietary bioleaching technology can extract metals from mine tailings while also neutralizing the arsenic within, has entered into discussions with Temex to consider processing the 1.8 million tonnes of tailings it has within the Cobalt camp.

The Temex tailings sit next to BacTech's Castle tailings, where president Ross Orr hopes to build a $20-million test plant to determine the viability of metal recovery. The initial plant would be able to treat 200,000 tonnes per year of tailings, which, if successful, would lead to a commercial-scale plant capable of treating a million tonnes per year.

There are an estimated 18-million tons of arsenic-laden tailings in the Cobalt camp, most of which still contain cobalt, nickel, copper and residual silver.

However, Orr harbors some concerns that the grades of cobalt and nickel within the Temex tailings are "just not that high," with silver grades hitting 1.75 to 2 ounces of silver per ton. In comparison, silver grades at the Castle tailings reach nearly 5 ounces of silver per ton.

"That's a $100 rock versus a $40 rock, or less, so we'll probably look for an additional site as well," says Orr.

These and other plans, however, are being delayed somewhat as a result of plans to look at splitting the company down the middle, something Orr says is necessary to better access public and private funding opportunities.

"Everything's deflected a bit in the short-term, because unbeknownst to us, having taken the technology into the mine tailings clean-up side, we created a lot of confusion amongst people who are shareholders and people who want to be shareholders."

As an example, he points to clean technology fund investors, who have shown some interest in the Cobalt work. However they are unable to invest in BacTech due to their association with primary mining projects through their use of bioleaching in active gold and base metal projects.

"The problem is if someone says 'Here's $100, but I don't want any of that money going toward mining,' you can't do that," says Orr, who still awaits word from the federal government for funding from Sustainable Development Technology Canada.

"With this break, the two companies will be totally separate...