The gold developer has been weighing up toll treating ore for some time in order to generate early cashflow ahead of underground production later this year.
Ore from Vanguard is currently being mined by contractor NRW Holdings and stockpiled.
Vanguard sits within the boundary of the proposed tailings storage facility and NRW is concurrently using the waste material from the pit to build the dam wall.
Roughly 100,000 tonnes of ore at about 3 grams per tonne gold will be trucked by MLG Oz via the Goldfields Highway to Leonora, 170km away, during the current quarter.
Genesis only took ownership of the 1.4 million tonne per annum Leonora mill and Gwalia mine on Saturday and its near-term strategy is to fill the mill via its own and third-party ore sources.
“Approximately 9600oz, or A$28 million in early revenue, will certainly assist in Bellevue’s race to first production,” Argonaut Securities analyst Ben Crooks said.
“The toll treatment arrangement [will] also potentially assist Gwalia in the early days of its Genesis transition.”
Bellevue said the toll treating agreement was expected to be net present value-accretive to the project as the open pit material would have otherwise remained on the stockpile until later in the mine life.
Construction of the 1Mtpa Bellevue processing facility continues on schedule and on budget, with first gold expected in the December quarter.
Underground mine development by contractor Develop is also on track with the fourth and final jumbo rig now on site and being commissioned.
The project is expected to produce 200,000ozpa at all-in sustaining costs of $1000-1100/oz over at least 10 years.
