Bactech partners Northern College for unique bioleaching program: training course to be the only one of its kind in Canada.

• Author: Stewart, Nick
• Position: MINING

With a proposed pilot plant in nearby Cobalt, BacTech Mining Corporation has teamed up with the Haileybury School of Mines to create a new bacterial oxidation technician course, the only one of its kind in Canada.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

"We're seeing a lot more opportunities pop up for the bioleaching technology that we have, but there aren't a lot of bioleach people in the world," says Ross Orr, president and CEO of BacTech.

"We need to have more people trained in this field, and it's as simple as that."

Expected to launch in September 2009, the one-year, two-semester program is expected to draw 15 students in its first year and will require the hire of an additional teacher.

The course material is being prepared in collaboration between Dr. Paul Miller, BacTech's vice-president of engineering and technology, and Dr. Chris Kennedy of the University of Toronto.

Currently BacTech is seeking to make use of its proprietary bioleaching technology to treat the arsenic-laden mine tailings scattered throughout the Cobalt area. In so doing, the company hopes to recover the silver and cobalt left behind.

The proposed $20 million plant, for which BacTech is still seeking government funding, would initially process 200,000 tonnes of tailings from the former Castle Mine near Gowganda.

Additional bioleaching facilities are expected be built around the world in the years to come as mining communities seek to salvage and clean abandoned tailings.

There are 20 such facilities across the globe, having been built over the last two decades, and while there are some in Africa, China and Australia, none currently exist in Canada.

With no Canadian schools teaching bioleaching-related courses, Orr guesses there are no more than four people across Canada who currently have sufficient knowledge in bioleaching to operate such the pilot plant. Two of these, Kennedy and Miller, are already in the employ of BacTech.

Still, Haileybury School of Mines is in Cobalt's proverbial backyard, and a steady influx of requests for jobs in the pilot plant has already filtered in. With this, Orr saw an opportunity to create a local program which is...