Six years after the anti-mining policies of the former government forced its closure, Australian-based miner Kingsgate Consolidated has gained departmental approval to reopen the large-scale Chatree openpit gold mine in central Thailand.
Chatree produced more than 1.8Moz gold and 10Moz silver since commercial operations began in Nov 2001.
Kingsgate announced updated ore reserves of 1.3Moz gold and 12.2Moz silver at Chatree last year.
Thai subsidiary Akara Resources will start the full commissioning of the mines second processing plant using stockpiled ROM pad ore, ramping up plant 2 to full production capacity and commence processing of the stockpiled ore by Thai contractor Lotus Hall.