The Porgera Gold mine in the highlands of Papua New Guinea (PNG), treats 5.5 - 6.0 million tonnes of ore per year with 2 x 28 (4.5MW) SAG Mills and 9MW of combined ball milling capacity.
The Porgera operation comprises both open pit and underground mining operations and since the first gold pour in 1990, more than 143 million tonnes of ore have been mined, producing over 20 million ounces of gold. On the 26th of February 2018, a magnitude 7.5 earthquake struck the Hela province to the south of Porgera, disabling the 65MW Hides gas turbine power station which supplied the mine.
Limited diesel power generation at the mine site allowed for partial milling, flotation and direct leaching of flotation concentrate, without autoclave oxidation for 3 months post the earthquake while the Hides power station was restored to full operation. This paper captures learnings from this interim processing phase, including the CIP control and tailings chemistry, and the cold restart of the autoclaves once power was restored.
CITATION:Palme Jnr, R, Sagaliana, D, Akis, D and Burger, B, 2019. Porgera Post Earthquake Learnings, in Proceedings MetPlant 2019, pp 355374 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).