A South Island mining company is seeking to renew extraction of gold from a Northern Southland area that has a long history with the prized mineral.
Bromoore Gold Limited has lodged resource consent applications to establish an alluvial gold mine in Winding Creek Valley, to the east of Waikaia.
The operation would involve excavation of two transient mine pits, construction of settling ponds, installation of supporting facilities, processing of gold bearing wash, stockpiling overburden, dust mitigation, installation of a sign and rehabilitation of the site.
The company is wholly owned by Ross Daniel Moore, of Rosco Contractors Ltd, a contract mining and earthmoving organisation in the South Island that has experience in the nearby area.
This includes Waikaia Gold’s five-year operation, which recovered more than 2200kg of gold from mining the Waikaia River flood plain.
Its operations stopped in 2019.
During this time, a worker operating earthmoving machinery at the mine was killed in 2015 and his employer, Rosco Contractors Ltd, later admitted failing to ensure the safety of an employee.
The Reefton company was prosecuted and ordered to pay $152,000 in reparations and fines.
Bromoore Gold Limited’s application to the Southland District Council and Environment Southland details its confidence the proposed mining methodology, groundwater management and rehabilitation measures were achievable, with minimal effect on the environment and no ongoing effects.
Historically, the site had been used primarily for agriculture and gold mining.
It is close to two small closed landfills.
The mining operation would be for a duration of three to four years, and an estimated 500,000cu m to 700,000cu m of material would be excavated each year.
It expected 150,000cu m of gold-bearing wash to be processed.
Southland District Council determined the application should be be publicly notified, as it found there were special circumstances, being potential public interest in an operation of this intensity and scale in a rural setting.
Submissions can be made until August 26.
