The chief executive of AngloGold Ashanti said the world's No. 3 gold producer could employ deep-mining technology under development in South Africa in other countries, with future ore discoveries expected to be far below the surface.
AngloGold in South Africa aims to go from 4 kms (2-1/2 miles) down to 5 kms by using radical techniques such as cutting rocks instead of blasting to unlock 70 million additional ounces of gold.
"This can be applied elsewhere, whether it is 500 meters or 5,000 meters," Chief Executive Mark Cutifani said in a telephone interview on November 09 after the group unveiled a surge in third-quarter earnings that beat market expectations.
He also said he expected to find ore bodies at South African depths outside the country and that it was vital to get the technology right now. "The one underlying message is that we have done a pretty good job finding the shallow stuff. But most of the world's ore bodies that we find in the future will be deeper," he said.
AngloGold currently operates the world's deepest mines, and its Mponeng operation in South Africa is about 4 km down. Asked if he expected to find ore bodies at similar depths elsewhere, Cutifani said: "I think we can."
"In Australia we are at 1,000 meters, and we don't have the bottom of the ore body at Sunrise Dam mine, so who knows? In Brazil we've got operations down to 2.5 kms, and we don't see the bottom of the ore body there," he said. Miners in South Africa are blazing the technological trail to depths that until recently would have seemed like science fiction.
"The nature of the reef structure in South Africa makes it particularly suited to these sets of technology changes," Cutifani said. These changes involve replacing blasting with machines to mechanically cut the rock and removing workers from the narrow passages known as stopes.
AngloGold has signaled it wants a working model for this transition in three to five years. "It will take another five years to covert the whole operation in South Africa to that style of mining," Cutifani said.