Eloise steps into the spotlight

Eloise mine south-east of Cloncurry in North Queensland is starting to find its mojo. Eloise was discovered in 1988 by BHP and brought into production in 1996-97 and operated under several companies owned by Barminco founder Peter Bartlett. AIC Mines acquired the project in November 2021. Prio to AIC Mines’ ownership the copper gold operation existed as a stand-alone cash generator for its private owner for more than 16 years. During that time the focus was on exploiting the low hanging fruit with little focus on expansion or exploration. The operation had settled into respectable, but small scale, producing around 12,000tpa of copper. Related: Eloise shines with bumper figures for AIC Mines That was considered sub-optimal by AIC Mines and they devised an acquisition and exploration plan to take the operation to the next level, managing director Aaron Colleran said. With the acquisition of the nearby Jericho deposit in January 2023, plus an additional 17,000m of drilling by AIC Mines, the Eloise plus Jericho resources now totalled 22.9 million tonnes making for a 20-year mine life for the combined project, Mr Colleran said. Mr Colleran, who was previously business development manager at Evolution Mining, said it would be the start of a new beginning for the mine. AIC Mines managing director Aaron Colleran. “The Eloise expansion creates our first cornerstone asset in AIC Mines,” he said. “Eloise plus Jericho produces a 20,000 tonne per annum copper mine. “That's our first asset of what I would like to be three to five. I would like AIC Mines to be producing 100,000 to 150,000 tonnes per annum of copper. That would be mid-tier status. “Our long-term strategy is to grow AIC Mines to mid-tier status,” Mr Colleran said. “The beauty of mid-tier status is you are still small enough to deliver outsized returns to shareholders through exploration success, development success, acquisition success and production success. Related: Wheels in motion for Jericho mine to be online in 2025 “But you're large enough to be able to fund your growth, able to attract high quality people and to deliver predictable, reliable results quarter on quarter. “It's ambitious, there's no doubt about that. It would require me to do Eloise multiplied by five, and I'm not saying that we are going to make Eloise five times bigger, but I would like to acquire, develop or discover four other similar size assets to Eloise.” The challenge will be finding the next two or three Jericho’s on the surrounding 2000 square kilometres of exploration leases acquired through the takeover of Demetallica Limited in 2023. “The 2000 sq km package hasn't been explored before through a hub and spoke lens because the previous explorers of that ground didn't own Eloise, so they were looking for something quite different. “A 5Mt resource is meaningful to us. A 10Mt resource is very meaningful to us. “10 million tonnes is about that level where we'd think of expanding the Eloise processing plant from the 1.1Mtpa current ambition to 1.5Mtpa, which would get us up to 25,000tpa, potentially 30,000tpa of copper production. “That's more than a cornerstone asset. That's a great asset and hence the next 12 months, that's what the exploration team are focused on doing.” Main image: Eloise mine courtesy Budd Photography You may also like: https://industryqld.com.au/pybar-in-149m-contract-win-as-jericho-mine-work-advances/

Eloise steps into the spotlight

Industry Queensland

Related News

Dolphins make a splash with coalfields kids

Boost for critical minerals processing plans

The industrial action that helped build a city

Get access to breaking mining news, now.