Cleaner gold mining from breakthrough technology

Singapore

CLEAN Mining, an Australian tech firm, has launched an ore processing technology that replaces the use of toxic chemical cyanide in gold mining. The patented technology acquired by Clean Mining was developed by Australia's government research agency Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) over a period of 10 years.

Mines typically use a cyanide-based plant for ore processing and need to store the by-products in a dam called a tailings dam, long enough for the cyanide to be destroyed. The cost of using and maintaining tailings dams can go up to millions of dollars, said Paul Hanna, founder and chairman of Clean Mining, during the launch held at the third Asia-Pacific Precious Metals Conference in Singapore.