PROJECT UPDATE: Good News Keeps Coming for Stornoway Diamond

In the past week, Stornoway Diamond (TSX:SWY) has made two positive announcements regarding its Quebec-based Renard diamond project.

Last Tuesday, the company came forward with the news that the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency has made a positive environmental assessment decision regarding Renard. As a result, Stornoway is now in possession of all the major provincial and federal government authorizations it needs to commence construction at its flagship mine.

Matt Manson, the company’s president and CEO, commented in a press release, “[t]oday’s announcement of the completion of major project permitting at Renard comes just 18 months after the filing of the project’s Environmental and Social Impact Assessment,” also noting that when the company opens the Renard mine road later in the year, the project will become Canada’s first fully permitted diamond mining project.

Today, Stornoway released more good news in the form of an updated mineral resource estimate for the project. The new estimate, which includes results of both the Renard 65 bulk sampling completed in February and recent geotechnical and hydrogeological drilling, shows that the project’s total indicated mineral resource now sits at 27.1 million carats, a 14-percent increase over the previous numbers, while its total inferred mineral resource clocks in at 16.9 million carats, 3.5 percent less than was previously thought.

The company has identified a further 25.7 to 47.8 million carats as targets for further exploration “to 775 m depth, below which each kimberlite remains open.”

“The updated Mineral Resource estimate has re-confirmed the very large upside of 25.7 to 47.8 million carats outside the formal Indicated and Inferred categories at Renard. Taken together, Renard represents one of the world’s most important new sources of high value diamonds,” said Manson.

The Renard mine is expected to have an 11-year reserve-based mine life during which time diamond production should average 1.6 million carats per year, according to Stornoway’s website. Its initial capital cost is C$752 million.

The company’s website also notes that as per the project’s current development schedule, first road access to the project will be achieved by the fourth quarter of this year. Following two years of construction, plant commissioning is set to begin in December 2015, while commercial production is expected to start in 2016.

Securities Disclosure: I, Charlotte McLeod, hold no direct investment interest in any company mentioned in this article.

Editorial Disclosure: Stornoway Diamond is a client of the Investing News Network. This article it not paid-for content.