Amerigo Resources Ltd. (TSX: ARG; OTCQX: ARREF) provided an update regarding operations at Minera Valle Central (“MVC”), the Company’s 100% owned operation located near Rancagua, Chile. MVC’s operations were temporarily disrupted on June 23, 2023, following a significant climatic event which affected central Chile. Repairs are underway and are expected to be completed earlier than originally estimated.
As reported in Amerigo’s news release of June 26, 2023, torrential rainfall on the night of Friday, June 23, 2023, brought down three high-voltage towers connecting MVC to Chile’s central power grid, causing a total power outage at the MVC plant. MVC reported no further damage to critical infrastructure, no injuries, and no accidents.
Earlier this year, MVC completed a risk-mitigation project to install protective flotation equipment around the pipes transporting water and slurry between the Cauquenes historical tailings deposit and MVC’s concentrator plant. Without this protection, there would have been material damage to these connecting pipelines.
MVC received an initial estimate that replacing the infrastructure to reconnect MVC to the power grid could take up to four weeks. A leading Chilean power infrastructure provider has begun sourcing and installing new towers, cables, aerial conductors, and ancillary equipment. It is now expected that the repair work will be completed by July 9, 2023, two weeks earlier than originally estimated, enabling MVC to reconnect to the central grid and resume normalized copper and molybdenum concentrates production on July 10, 2023.
MVC’s daily production is approximately 180,000 pounds of copper and 3,000 pounds of molybdenum. It is estimated that 2023 production will be lower by about 3 million pounds (“M lbs”) of copper and 50,000 lbs of molybdenum because of the power disruption.
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