Tuesday, 31st October 2006 (1449 views)

Vancouver-based Continental Minerals Corporation has advanced the community and environmental programmes of its Xietongmen Copper and Gold Project, located 240 kilometres from Tibet's sacred city of Lhasa.

Feasibility studies on Xietongmen and the results of an extensive drilling programme are expected in the fourth quarter of this year. But the environmental and community engagement arms of the project are well advanced.

The US firm has acquired the right to earn up to a 60 per cent interest in the copper and gold property, where exploration began in April 2005. Xietongmen hosts a large porphyry-like copper-gold deposit, with potential for open pit mining.

Continental has a five-person team in place, charged with assessing and discussing the project with locals and outlining its potential economic benefits for the community.

To date community talks have focused on suitable locations for drill roads, with a view to limiting interference with community grazing grounds connected to the three local villages in the area.

The environmental studies needed to assess the impact of the project are also in hand. Hydrological studies are nearing completion and flora and fauna studies are done. But weather data and water well monitoring are continuing.

For a long time simply an inaccessible region of the People's Republic of China, Tibet is now increasingly open to commercial interests, with the arrival of China's newest railway.

In the last five years, over 100,000 workers have constructed a 1,140-kilometre track across mountains and permafrost between Lhasa and Qinghai, a frontier city from where existing track continues to the capital Beijing.

 

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