Design Considerations at the Cigar Lake Project

Abstract

The Cigar Lake uranium deposit in northern Saskatchewan is the largest high grade uranium deposit in the world with a total reserve of 385 million pounds U3 0o. The main section of the deposit has a total geological reserve of 285 million pounds at an average grade of 14% U30o.Cigar Lake Mining Corporation (CLHC) which is developing this deposit is a wholly owned operating company established by the joint venture owners, Saskatchewan Mining Development Corporation, Cogema Canada Ltd., Idemitsu Uranium Exploration Canada Ltd., Corona Grande Exploration Corporation, and Korea Electric Power Corporation. CLMC has recently commenced an underground evaluation of the deposit. This program which is expected to take about 2-1/2 years to complete involves sinking a 500 metre deep shaft, and drifting out to the ore zone on two levels. Once the orebody is reached trial mining methods will be carried out to demonstrate the technical feasibility of mining the deposit. Following completion of the Test Mine and the feasibility study in 1990 the owners will be in a position to take a final decision on development and production influenced by market conditions at the time. This paper describes the geological characteristics of the deposit and the development of the test mining program.