Fulcrum Metals plc has signed a formal “collaborative working agreement” with Apitipi Anicinapek Nation (AAN) relating to the Teck Hughes and Sylvanite tailings projects in Kirkland Lake, Ontario.
LEGACY
The agreement also lays the foundation for future agreements on “shared benefits and opportunities” from the projects.
Fulcrum said that the two parties had held “extensive” consultations over time on how to work together to develop responsibly the projects and other legacy mine waste in the province.
Chief executive Ryan Mee added: “This agreement reflects both the mutual recognition that legacy mine waste sites need to be addressed and the desire to see the development of Fulcrum’s sites in a collaborative, mutually beneficial and respectful manner.
“I would like to thank the AAN community for their support in making this partnership happen and look forward to working with them as we explore potential opportunities with meaningful social and environmental benefits.“
Director, negotiations and contract management for AAN, Lance Black said that the agreement aligned with AAN’s priorities of “fully remediating” the land from the “legacy of environmental contamination”.
“Fulcrum’s focus on reprocessing historic tailings offers a rare opportunity to clean up a site that has been left polluted for far too long and provide benefits to our Nation in the process.
“It’s refreshing to work with a company that recognises the importance of environmental responsibility from the outset.
“Others with far greater resources and much larger footprints in the Kirkland Lake area have had decades to do the right thing – and haven’t.”
Fulcrum recently acquired an exclusive licence to use non-cyanide technology on gold mine waste sites over the Timmins and Kirkland Lake mining districts, which include Teck Hughes and Sylvanite.
The company aims to extract the “significant mineral wealth and the potential environmental benefits” across “two of Canada’s biggest gold camps” which produced more than 110 million ounces of gold and left more than 70 mine waste sites.