Canada-listed Gemdale Gold reported on 5 November that conventional cyanide leaching recovered 91% of gold from a composite sample at its Pontio project in Finland in about eight hours. The result is preliminary evidence that the mineralisation may be treatable without a complex refractory processing route, but it does not establish reserves or profitability.
UK-based SLR Consulting undertook the metallurgical testing, with cyanide consumption of 0.6 kilograms per tonne. The sample came from Gemdale Gold’s earlier 2026 drilling programme. The company is targeting an initial mineral resource estimate for Pontio in early 2027.
Flotation and concentrate results
Alternative rougher flotation tests recovered up to 87.5% of copper and 70.5% of gold into a sulphide concentrate. The results came from open-circuit tests and are not final plant recoveries; later stages of a commercial processing circuit can reduce the proportion of metal reporting to a saleable concentrate.
The tested feed material graded approximately 0.70 grams per tonne gold and 0.071% copper. The best preliminary cleaning result produced a concentrate grading 6.5% copper and 47.5 grams per tonne gold, indicating a combined gold-copper product might be technically possible.
Processing routes remain under study
Direct leaching would focus on gold recovery, while flotation could add copper revenue but would require concentrate marketing, transport and smelter terms. Gemdale Gold has not selected a final processing flowsheet or established the economic advantage of either option.
Further work is planned to include locked-cycle flotation tests, additional leaching of flotation tailings and studies of pyrrhotite separation. The laboratory measured a Bond work index of 18.16 kilowatt-hours per tonne, indicating grinding energy is likely to be relevant to future processing economics.
The results reduce one area of technical uncertainty ahead of a resource estimate, but Gemdale Gold still needs to demonstrate the deposit’s scale, verify recoveries across representative ore types and quantify capital and operating costs before determining whether Pontio can support a commercial operation.
