Amidst the general fall in metal prices over the last few years, the gold price has remained comparatively stable in the US$1,000-1,250/oz range. Gold bulls were disappointed that the price did not break through the $2,000/oz ceiling; nevertheless the current stable price run has helped to maintain a strong interest in gold projects.

Gold processing has a couple of unique features. The first is the sheer variety of the mineralogical characteristics and associations, which is what this article is mainly about.

The second is the sustained, and dare I say sustainable, use of cyanide for gold leaching in the last 100 years or more in a world of increasing environmental concerns and general aversion to the use of toxic chemical like cyanide. Alternatives to cyanide are not the subject of this article, but it is suffice to say that recent applications of alternatives to cyanide, e.g. thiosulfate at Goldstrike Nevada, have been driven by technical rather than environmental imperatives. In the case of Goldstrike, this was a double-refractory ore combining sulphide-occluded gold with preg-robbing carbonaceous material that rendered the ore unsuitable for conventional cyanide leaching and carbon adsorption.

In most cases, gold processing with cyanide leaching, usually with carbon adsorption, is still the core technology and the critical thing is understanding the mineralogy in order to optimise flowsheet selection and cost drivers, and get the best out of the process.

Metallurgy: the science of bashing, mashing and hashing!

Metallurgical processing of metalliferous ores in general and gold ores in particular, consists essentially of three stages, often colloquially referred to as:

• Bashing (crushing);
• Mashing (grinding); and
• Hashing (extraction/recovery)

In the context of flowsheet selection, the bashing and mashing stages are relatively straightforward. However, there are a number of other considerations when it comes to the hashing stage.

Stages 1 and 2: bashing and mashing

Traditionally, the process selection choice was between a conventional, well-tried, three-stage crushing circuit followed by ball milling, or single-stage crushing followed by a semi-autogenous (SAG) mill and ball mill. The latter is preferred for wet sticky ores to minimise transfer point chute blockages, and can offer savings in both capital costs and long-term operating and maintenance costs. However, the SAG route is more power-intensive and, for very hard ores, comes with some process risk in predicting performance.

More recently, a hybrid solution has become available in the form of high pressure grinding rolls (HPGRs), which can replace the third stage of crushing and also the SAG mill.

Now that initial wear issues have largely been overcome, they offer significant advantages over a SAG mill route where power costs are high and the ore is very hard. They can be attractive too in a heap leach where the micro-cracking induced by the high pressure has been demonstrated in many cases to improve heap leach recovery.

Stage 3: hashing

The hashing stage (corresponding to metal extraction and recovery stages) is a little more complex for gold ores, as the optimal process flowsheet selection choice is heavily dependent on a good understanding of two fundamental geometallurgical parameters, the gold mineralogical associations, and the gold particle size and liberation characteristics. These are summarised in Table 2, where the processing options that correspond to the various combinations of mineral associations and liberation are shown along with some examples.

Some other key drivers in flowsheet selection at the hashing stage are:

Supergene weathering

This is common in tropical environments (e.g. West Africa) and typically oxidises gold-bearing sulphides down to 50-100m, transforming commonly refractory gold in sulphides to ‘free-milling’ gold, behaving in a similar fashion to gold associated with quartz.

Gold:sulphur ratio (GSR)

Refractory ores are typically treated by flotation and the resulting flotation concentrate may be sold directly to a smelter (common for example in China) or subjected to downstream processing by pressure oxidation or bio-leach.

An ore containing 1% sulphur will produce a mass pull of approximately 5% by weight to a bulk flotation concentrate where recovery is the key driver. If this ore also contains 1g/t Au (for GSR =1), and 90% recovery to concentrate is achieved, then 0.90g will be recovered and with a concentration ratio of 20 (5% to concentrate) this corresponds to 18g/t Au in concentrate.

At current gold prices this is worth about US$600.

Both smelter treatment charges and oxidation or bio-leach costs are at least $200/t of concentrate and payables/recovery in the 90% range, so a minimum GSR for effective downstream processing is around 0.5. Clearly this is a function of gold price, but in the current gold price and cost environment, a good rule of thumb is that a minimum GSR of 0.5 is required for downstream processing of a gold-bearing concentrate.

A lower GSR can be tolerated if the flotation concentrate is amenable to direct cyanide leaching without the costly oxidation stage to release the gold from the sulphides. And on-site doré production avoids the off-site costs of transport and smelter charges, but usually with lower recovery (flotation recovery then oxidation-leach recovery) so a trade-off analysis is required.

Gold/silver base metal concentrate deportment

Smelters typically pay >95% (Au) and 90% (Ag) in copper and lead concentrates, but will only pay 60-70% (maximum, depending on degree of Pb/Zn smelter integration) for gold and silver in zinc concentrates.

Cost drivers are also important in flowsheet selection, and are summarised in Table 3.

It can be seen that the key cost elements are: power, cyanide and grinding steel plus, for refractory ores, the costs associated with pressure oxidation or bio-leaching. It should also be noted that, where cyanide destruction is required (increasingly the norm), then cyanide detox unit costs are usually of a similar order of magnitude to the cyanide unit cost.

In summary, and of particular relevance to project screening, an early appreciation of gold mineralogical associations and liberation can provide considerable insight into metallurgical process flowsheet selection and processing costs.