Carnilya hill

Although mining ceased at the Carnilya Hill mine in March 2012, it remains in care and maintenance and should ongoing exploration be successful and world nickel prices increase, the opportunity might present itself where mining at the mine could once again re-commence.

Carnilya Hill Infrastructure is Kept Secure and Well Maintained
Access to the Carnilya Hill Mine decline and other mine infrastructure is being kept secure and well maintained with the joint venture partners, Mincor and Celsius (through its subsidiary, View Nickel Pty Ltd) incurring nominal running costs, while the future of the mine is being determined.

Mincor is the Operator at the Carnilya Hill Mine
Mincor Resources NL operates the Carnilya Hill mine on behalf of the joint partners and as such are continuing their exploration program within the nearby tenements, although this activity has become less intensive than it had been previously.

Carnilya Hill Mine is Part of the North Kambalda Nickel Project
The Carnilya Hill Mine is part of Mincor's North Kambalda nickel project that includes the Mitel, McMahon, Mariners and Otter Juan nickel mines. All underground mines carrying out narrow vein mining operations. The Kambalda nickel area, located near Kalgoorlie, in the Western Australia Eastern Goldfields, has become one of the worlds more notable nickel rich provinces, having been discovered by WMC Resources in 1968. The area had produced in excess of 1.4 million tonnes of nickel metal from 47 million tonnes of ore since that time. Today Mincor is the area's leading nickel producer having resurrected interest in nickel mining in the area since its involvement that began in 2001.

From 2001 to the end of 2010, Mincor production from its Kambalda operations had reached a level in excess of 112,000 tonnes of nickel-in- concentrate and 127,000 tonnes of nickel metal from the mining of 4.2 million tonnes of ore. At the same time exploration and acquisitions had increased Mincor's ore reserve five-fold, more than replacing what had been mined.

Ore taken from the Carnilya Hll mine, as with Mincor's other mines in the area, is toll treated at the BHP Billiton processing plant at Kambalda. The concentrate is then purchased by BHP Billiton under a long term off take agreement between the two companies. To the end of September, 2011, Mincor's Kambalda's operations had achieved an annual production of 3034 tonnes of nickel, 185 tonnes of copper and 37 tonnes of cobalt.

Carnilya Hill was a High Producer of Nickel
During its operation the Carnilya Hill Mine produced 15,000 tonnes of ore a month that returned it 5,000 tonnes of nickel a year. The first ore mined at Carnilya Hill occurred in January 2008. All ore was trucked from the mine to BHP Billiton's Concentrator plant.

The ore body at Carnilya Hill was discovered in 1974 and was originally mined from 1980 as a joint venture between BHP and WMC. Known ore reserves were exhausted in 1999 and the mine was closed for the first time. However, View Resources carried out limited mining activity at Carnilya Hill between 2004 and 2005. Mincor entered a joint venture arrangement with View Resources in the latter half of 2005 and exploratory drilling started in March 2006.
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