Ecuador Project
Tuyano River
Location, access and infrastructure
The area is covered by tropical vegetation of the Amazon Rain Forest. The weather is hot and humid. The raining season runs from March to August while the dry season from September to February. Temperature ranges between 21 and 26oC. The average precipitation is 341 mm3/month. The general gradient is decreasing from west to east and the natives have developed small farms (agriculture and cattle) close to the rivers. In the Tuyano sector there is no longer native forest.
The Concession is located in Napo Province, 120 kilometers southeast of Quito (the capital of Ecuador) and is 30 kilometers southeast of Tena, the capital of Napo Province and cover a regular area of 1,000 hectares in the Tuyano River. To reach the concession there is a 12 kilometers gravel road from Misahualli to the community of Tuyano.
Electric power to the mine site is supplied from the national grid and water supply is currently pumped from the Tuyano River.
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Geology
The prior concession holder (presently a minority shareholder of RHR Inc.) invested over US$2 million in the Rio Napo concessions in a 2 to 3 year period (of which over US$1 million was directly related to mineral exploration). This work involved the sampling of vertical channels, shafts and drill holes that indicated the distribution of gold and heavy minerals varies vertically, laterally and along strike within the host gravels.
Stratigraphic sections constructed on the basis of drilling, carried out by the previous owner of the Property within the Boardwalk 16 Concession, indicate that the fluvial sediments in this area are comprised of five recognizable stratigraphic units that can be differentiated on the basis of clast size and proportion of matrix and gold tenor: a basal gravely sand, a lower and upper gravel with a sandy matrix, and an intervening boulder-rich conglomerate unit with an argillaceous sand matrix. In general, successive units have been deposited within erosional channels that were cut into preceding units, but laterally, units are interbedded. The Tuyano River activity has reworked the ancient Napo River terraces and glacier deposits producing new gold concentrations zones in the new Tuyano Terraces.
Economic Geology
Bolaños (2002) points out in the Ascendant final report “Evaluation of the Rio Napo Concessions” as an Indicated Resources in the Tuyano Sector of 143,268,838 m3 @ 154 mg/m3 giving 709,434 troy ounces of fine gold; the area is situated on the left bank of Rio Napo and extends over a set of primary, secondary, and ternary alluvial terraces of the Rio Napo. The terraces are presently cut by a small creek draining surrounding hills.” Two bulk samples of 1,250 cubic meters were take in the Tuyano Terraces using excavator and a small washing plant to differentiate these terraces from the Napo Terraces. A total of 655.4 gold grams from the two samples were concentrate with a gold tenor of 0.524 grams per cubic meter. For bulk calculations along the Tuyano Terraces a gold general tenor of 0.318 grams per cubic meter will be considered.
EXPLOITATION SYSTEM PROPOSED The ore reserves calculation, gravel characteristics and geographical location have allowed establishing an exploitation system that it will cause a minimum negative impact in exchange for a great positive impact in the area. After retiring the vegetation and being stored for the elaboration of compost, the excavator and the tractor are the basic tools to uncover the terraces, to store the soil next to the area of the vegetation, so that, after the exploitation of the gravel, to restore the properly blended soil with the cumulative compost producing this way an improvement of the soils in the sector. During the trial of reinstatement of materials to the exploited area, channels and drainages are implemented to facilitate the displacement of water to avoid floods and marshy areas. With the excavator the gravel material will be removed from the banks to the provided chute of vibration that will classify the material until a diameter of 2 cm ; the selected material will be transported until a first trap of nuggets gold (jigs); after this trap, the material go to a series of slush boxes of 12 meters of longitude and 1.5 m of width provided metallic rifles and carpet. The washed gravels are displaced to temporary storage and then to stuff the exploited banks, maintaining a sequence with the soil to be restored. The necessary water for process will be provisioned of the Tuyano River using bombs, after its use the water will be deviated to at least three decantation pools before being returned to its normal course. To keep dry the exploitation bank submergible bombs will be used and the volume of material treaty will be between 500 and 800 cubic meters per day in two working shifts. While gravel and soil is restored a new bank of exploitation will be open and the concentration plant will move toward a second position. The recovered concentrate will be treated in the "room of gold" using shaking tables or other mechanical concentrators. During the whole process the specific weight of the gold will be used to have a highly gravimetric system of recovery without the use of chemical reagents.
