Pan American to invest nearly US$520mn to expand its Shahuindo gold mine

Canadian miner Pan American Silver is preparing an investment of around US$518mn to expand operations at the Shahuindo gold mine in Peru's Cajamarca region.

According to the environmental certification service for sustainable investments (Senace), the company presented an eighth supporting technical report (ITS), which is under evaluation and was prepared by consulting firm EAS.

In Peru, an ITS is filed when proposed modifications are not expected to have a significant environmental and social impact, unlike changes to environmental impact studies (EIS) that require more exhaustive evaluation.

See the ITS in the Documents box in the top right corner.

The proposed modifications are part of expansion plans for all of Pan American's units in Peru. In late April, the company presented documents to expand Huarón in Pasco region for US$21mn and filed a fourth modification of the EIS for work at La Arena, involving US$59mn, earlier this month.

Shahuindo – acquired in 2019 after the purchase of Tahoe Resources' shares – is Pan American's most important asset in the region. In 2023, the mine produced 141,100oz of gold, compared to La Arena's 97,100oz.

According to company projections, Shahuindo will produce 122,000-144,000oz of gold in 2024 and will receive US$76-80mn of the US$235mn in investments proposed in the modifications, if the ITS is approved.

DETAILS

The ITS outlines seven modifications, with the main one being the expansion of the Chalarina open pit, by 25.4ha of the 174ha available, needed "due to a new extension of orebody to the northeast of the deposit."

This expansion will require the:

• optimization of water resources at Chalarina via contact water management ponds and a water treatment system for road irrigation;
• expansion of the leaching pad by no more than 20%;
• reconfiguration of the tailings facility, given that the approved environmental footprint overlaps with the proposed Chalarina pit expansion;
• relocation and expansion of no more than 20% of the planned acid water treatment plant.

According to the report, work on the treatment plant will not imply greater costs or changes to feasibility engineering. 

The modification of the effluent and sedimentation pools system of the tailings deposit and a new mining quarry are also planned.

“Due to the scarcity of relevant material in the extraction area of the Chalarina pit, it is necessary to have a quarry with adequate material to ballast the tracks and obtain material with appropriate characteristics for the Overliner. The decision is being made to extract that material from the CA-01 quarry. The location of the quarry does not overlap with any approved component or nearby fragile ecosystem,” the report said.

SCHEDULE AND COSTS

Work on the proposals will be carried out in parallel and take between two and nine months. With six and nine months, the pit expansion and the reconfiguration of the tailings deposit will take the longest.

The following table details the cost of each proposal.

Proposed modification	Cost (US$)
Implementation of quarry CA-01	291,988
Expansion of leaching pad No. 2	952,546
Reconfiguration of the tailings deposit	7.73mn
Effluent pond system	11.3mn
Relocation of water treatment plant	-
Chalarina pit expansion	497mn
Optimization of Chalarina water resources	500,000

Source: EAS