[Rockhounds] Update on Barrick Mining's 'Unlock the Value' $10M Competition

[Kreigh Tomaszewski]

My proposal didn't make the cut, but I had a lot of fun trying (and 
shared many details with the List). I thought some of you might be 
interested to know progress is still being made...


Barrick Gold Corporation announced today that nine scientific proposals 
have been selected for the Phase 3 Concept Testing of the company’s 
innovative Unlock the Value program.

Teams that have advanced this far will receive US$25,000, and Barrick 
will support funding of the next research phase.

The successful teams have already passed two levels of scrutiny that 
narrowed the field from 238 preliminary submissions to 16 detailed 
proposals and now nine finalists. These nine proposals will now undergo 
proof of concept testing at the laboratory scale to investigate the 
performance of the technology. If the proof of concept is confirmed, 
technology development will progress to pilot and integrated pilot 
levels. All development and proof-of-concept testing will be managed 
and supervised by Barrick’s Research and Development team. Based on the 
success in Phase 3, Barrick will determine if the proposed solution can 
proceed to the fourth and final phase -- Commercial Scale Economic 
Evaluation. Testing may take two or more years.

“We’re very encouraged by the quality of submissions we’ve received,” 
said Dr. Peter Kondos, Barrick’s Senior Manager of Research and 
Development. “We’ve selected nine potential solutions that are worthy 
of further development, and we hope that one or more of these will 
prove an economically viable solution.”

Successful participants have now been notified. Details of the selected 
proposals will not be released. To participate in Phase 3, teams must 
sign a Development Services Agreement that defines the level of funding 
from Barrick, the technical role of the participating team, and the 
management of intellectual property rights.
   
  Launched in September 2007, the Unlock the Value program invited 
scientists to submit proposals for increasing silver recovery from the 
ore at Barrick’s Veladero gold mine. Scientists submitted proposals 
through a special website www.unlockthevalue.com. Barrick is offering a 
$10 million performance bonus for a successfully implemented soIution.