May 13, 2008

Nautilus Minerals plans to mine sea floor for copper and gold

Richard Gilbert

staff writer

A Vancouver company plans to be the first in the world to commercially explore the ocean floor for gold and copper, using technology developed by the oil and gas exploration industry.

Nautilus Minerals Inc. is in the early stages of planning a sea floor copper and gold mine named the Solwara 1 Project, which will be located in the territorial waters of Papua New Guinea.

The mine is in 1,500 metres of water in the Bismarck Sea, 50 kilometres north of Rabaul township in the western Pacific Ocean.

“Sea floor mining has some big advantages over land-based mining. In land-based mining it is about building infrastructure, such as roads, power lines, site stripping and foundation work,” said Scott Trebilcock, vice-president of corporate development at Nautilus.

“From a construction perspective, on the sea floor, we have to do very little other than deliver a machine to the sea floor. The whole mining system is a ship that moves into position over the mining site.

The ship puts a pipe and a large remote-operated machine on to the seafloor.

Nautilus is undertaking an engineering design program to evaluate the Seafloor Mining Tool and the requirements for a riser and lifting system (RALS) for mining production vessels.

The company announced on April 3, that it awarded a US$116 million contract to Technip USA Inc., which will provide engineering procurement and construction management services for the RALS components of its deepwater seafloor massive sulphide extraction system.

Late last year, Nautilus announced the awarding of a $33 million contract to Soil Machine Dynamics Ltd. of Newcastle upon Tyne, U.K., for the design and build of two Seafloor Mining Tools.

“From a technology perspective, the standard equipment for this mining system is fairly standard for the oil and gas exploration industry,” said Trebilcock.

“Soil Machine Dynamics is building a chain drag trencher, which digs a huge 25 metre trench. The riser and lifting system uses pumps and pipes to get the water slurry up to a dewatering system on the boat.”

The pumps are vital to the success of the operation.

“We are re-using technology from the oil and gas industry,” explained Trebilcock.

The majority of the equipment components will be provided by oilfield equipment specialists.

Nautilus proposes to select the vessel and mining services contractor in the second quarter of 2008.

With this timetable, the company remains on track for production at the Solwara 1 Project in the third quarter of 2010.

Print | Email | Comment