First gold ingots cast at Kittilä mine

Price of gold rises in uncertain times; mine seen as highly profitable exercise

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"Feels heavy”, says Canadian Carol Plummer, the 43-year-old director of the Kittilä mine belonging to the Canadian mining company Agnico-Eagle, whilst holding in her hand the fifth 25-kilo gold ingot cast in Kittilä in Finnish Lapland.
      The largest gold mine in Europe produced its first gold bullion bars on Tuesday.
     
The management of the mine were all smiles, and with good enough reason.
      The mine’s gold production will reach its projected level of around five tonnes of gold per year during this spring.
      This exceeds the combined amount of gold that has so far been panned from Lapland’s gold regions during the activity’s entire 130-year history.
     
The Canadians have another reason for celebration as well. The price of gold, unlike the price of industrial metals, has not plummeted as a result of the financial crisis.
      “The price of even this bar is around 724,000 dollars (EUR 574,000)”, calculates Ingmar Haga, Vice President, Europe of Agnico-Eagle.
      Seven years ago, when the mine was still at its planning stages, the ingot would have been worth only half of that, and even then the project was seen as a profitable exercise.
      The gold bars from Kittilä will be sold to European banks, for there is currently a high demand for gold as an investment commodity.
     
In the middle of the Lapland wilderness, around an hour’s drive from the village centre of Kittilä, there is a large enrichment facility and a mining community. Around EUR 115 million has been spent developing the site. The mine employs about 250 workers, and has an estimated lifetime of 15 years.
      “The mine may operate for even longer than that, for in the test drillings promising deposits have been found at a depth of about one kilometre”, Plummer explains. The present deposit reaches down to a depth of half a kilometre.
     
For Carol Plummer, who has her degree in mining engineering, the Kittilä mine is the seventh such venture in her career. Her father was also a mining engineer and her grandfather a miner.
      “Our family moved to Canada from the English Midlands in 1969. My career choice was a matter of course, but even in Canada there aren’t that many women in the field”, Plummer continues.
      “We plan to stay here for the first three years. My husband also works here on the security side”, Plummer says. She warmly recommends the field to women.
      “In this field you can see the world. Mind you, there are so many mines in Canada that it is quite possible to spend one’s entire career there as well, if one so desires.”
     
The world’s largest gold producer is South Africa.
      Other significant producers include the United States, Canada, Australia, Russia, China, and Peru.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Kittilä residents welcome news of new gold mine (7.6.2006)
  Europe´s largest gold mine to be opened in Finnish Lapland (6.6.2006)
  Canadian company buys gold deposit in Kittilä in Finnish Lapland (17.11.2005)

Links:
  Agnico-Eagle Mines
  Agnico-Eagle: Kittilä

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