Defense Metals advances pre-feasibility study
by CM staff
Site infrastructure geotechnical investigations planned include a series of excavated test pits and sonic overburden drill holes.
SRK engineering personnel logging WSF sonic overburden material (CNW Group/Defense Metals Corp.)
VANCOUVER — Defense Metals Corp., has provided a progress update with respect to its 2023 site infrastructure geotechnical investigations. The work, with support of the Defense Metals’ technical team and APEX Geoscience Ltd., is being completed by SRK Consulting (Canada) Inc., (SRK) one of the principal consultants for the preliminary feasibility study (PFS) regarding the Company’s Wicheeda Rare Earth Element (REE) Project located near Prince George, Canada.
“It is great to see our technical consulting teams making significant headway with the Wicheeda site investigations,” said Craig Taylor, CEO of Defense Metals. “Defence Metals has assembled a world class team of experts who have both the experience and technical skills to bring this project through pre-feasibility.”
The SRK geotechnical investigation includes the following scopes:
- Geotechnical engineering (waste rock, tailings, contact water pond, and site infrastructure geotechnical investigation),
- Tailings alternative assessment prior to advancing into PFS-level design of a preferred alternative,
- Geochemical characterization (to support mine planning/waste management and to develop preliminary water chemistry predictions for the main mine facilities).
The work completed to date included field site inspections from SRK personnel: Principial Consultant – Mining Rock Mechanics, Ed Saunders, P.Eng. (waste storage facility geotechnical); Principal Consultant – Geochemistry, Kirsty Ketchum, Ph.D., P.Geo. (metal leaching and acid/alkaline rock drainage geochemical characterization); and Senior Consultant- Mining Rock Mechanics, Aton Bloem (open pit geotechnical).
Site infrastructure geotechnical investigations planned include a series of excavated test pits, and sonic overburden drill holes designed to support the preliminary characterization of the shallow soil subsurface and bedrock foundations of potential future waste rock storage (WSF), mineralization stockpile, contact water pond (CWP), crusher, processing plant (INF), and tailings storage facility (TSF) locations.
