This article was originally published in the September 2013 issue of Sudbury Mining Solutions Journal.
Refining, milling, assaying and bulk sampling capacity creates critical mass
Proclaiming the rebirth of Cobalt, one of Ontario’s earliest mining camps, may be a stretch, but the recent reopening of the Yukon Refinery just north of town is a step in the right direction.
The refinery had been in mothballs for 13 of the preceding 15 years when United Commodity AG of Switzerland purchased it in June 2012. It has since added a Merrill-Crowe process for gold and silver recovery and struck some longterm deals for processing concentrate.
Originally a silver mill, Cobatec purchased and converted it to a recovery plant for tailings in the early 90s, recalled plant supervisor Gunner Skillins. “That didn’t work too well, so we went into feed from a smelter stack in Cuba containing both cobalt and nickel.”
That, too, proved short-lived. The plant shut down and was purchased in the late 90s by Canmine Resources, which operated it for a few years before going bankrupt. Ownership devolved to the bondholders represented by a Swiss financial group, which kept it on care and maintenance while trying to sell it for 10 years.