Argonaut Gold (TSX: AR) hired mining professional Marc Leduc to the position of chief operating officer for Argonaut today.
Leduc’s is a professional mining engineer and a geologist. His four-decade long career includes all areas of the mining cycle. His prior involvement includes such areas as exploration, design, permitting, construction, commissioning and operation of gold mines, including many complex heap leach projects.
“Marc and I worked closely at Barrick Gold and most recently in a private venture. I believe that Marc has the right skill set to facilitate Argonaut’s repositioning to a lower-cost North American gold company with significant organic growth opportunities,” said Richard Young, president and chief executive officer.
“Marc will work with our team on completing and commissioning of our flagship Magino mine in Ontario, evaluating the potential for operational improvements and the sulphide potential at Florida Canyon in Nevada and pursuing organic growth opportunities within our Mexican asset portfolio.”
Leduc has been in executive positions at several publicly traded companies since 2006. The list of positions and companies includes interim president and CEO of NewCastle Gold, which is one of the companies involved in a three-way merger to form Equinox Gold (TSX: EQX).
Marc Leduc. Image via Argonaut Gold.
He also helped lead the design team in the redesign of the Castle Mountain heap leach project in California. Consequently, this mine contains 4.2 million ounces of reserve and produces 218,000 ounces of gold per year.
Leduc was also a member of the design, permitting, construction and start-up team at Barrick Gold‘s (TSX: ABX) (NYSE: ABX) Pierina Mine in Peru.
Read more: 2023 will be a ‘very strong’ year for gold mining: NevGold
Read more: NevGold’s oxide gold drill program in Nevada finds positive results
Leduc brings multiple decades of experience to Argonaut Gold
Additionally, he worked on projects throughout the Americas, including Cerro San Pedro in Mexico, Aurizona in Brazil. Recently, Leduc served as chief operating officer at Kore Mining (TSXV: KORE). Here he focused on the Imperial heap leach project in California.
“Argonaut has significant organic growth potential as the Company transitions to a lower-cost producer in North America,” said Marc Leduc.
“With a strong focus on open pit and heap leach gold operations, we will work together to bring further scale to our portfolio of assets.”
Heap leaching is a separation process used in mining in which a series of chemical reactions are used to extract valuable metals from ore. The raw ore is sprayed with a leaching solution, which percolates through the ore and dissolves the valuable metals. The solution is then collected and processed to extract the valuable metals.
Read more: NevGold issues $1.5M in shares to GoldMining Inc. for Nutmeg Mountain project
Read more: NevGold starts drilling at Nutmeg Mountain property
NevGold Corp. (TSXV:NAU) (OTCQX:NAUFF) is another company making waves in the Canadian mining space. The team’s mining campaign at Resurrection Ridge has recently expanded the mineralized footprint. This confirms the company’s geologic model that mineralization continues to the northeast.
NevGold shares are up 1.3 per cent today and are now trading at $0.39.
.
Nevgold is a sponsor of Mugglehead news coverage
Follow Joseph Morton on Twitter
joseph@mugglehead.com
