Sunrise dam

The Sunrise Dam gold mine began life as an open pit mining operation in 1997 and in 2003 it was expanded to include an underground mine. In 2007, a record production year, it produced a total of 600,000 ounces of gold. The underground operation contributing 80,000 ounces in its own right. The owner of the mine, Anglo Gold Ashanti Limited, considerably reduced energy costs in 2008 when it completed the conversion its operation from diesel powered generation of electricity to that of liquefied natural gas (LNG). While reducing the cost of energy to operate the facility, the conversion to LNG also went a long way towards lowering the company's greenhouse emissions.

The Sunrise Dam Gold Mine is located east of Lake Carey, just over 50 kilometres from Laverton in the Northern Goldfields of Western Australia, 220 kilometres north east of Kalgoorlie.

Gold First Discovered at Sunrise Dam in 1988
A gold deposit was found to exist at Sunrise Dam in 1988 but it was not until 1995 before mining began there as an open pit operation with the first gold from the deposit being poured in March 1997. By 2008 the pit, known as the Mega Pit, had reached a depth of 440 metres.

AngloGold acquired the Sunrise Dam Mine in 1999 when it achieved a successful takeover of Acacia Resources Limited. Acacia, a former Billiton company, was eventually de-listed from the Australian Stock Exchange in early 2000.

Barminco Hold the Mining Contract at Sunrise Dam
Mining Contractor, Barminco, was given the contract to develop the underground mine at Sunrise Dam for a cost of $500 million. The largest contract Barminco had entered into up until that time and the second largest ever awarded in Australia. The contract included the underground development work as well as that of the underground mining operation, including production, once development was completed. Since it was first commissioned the Sunrise Dam mine has produced over five million ounces of gold.

A Fly In Fly Out Mining Operation at Sunrise Dam
Most people working at the Sunrise Dam Gold Mine work on fly in fly out basis. Western Australian airline company Skippers Aviation fly to and from the operation twice a day from Monday through to Friday throughout the year. There are more than 360 people working at the mine with 255 of them being contractors. The mine village was recently expanded to cater for the growing number of mine workers. The mine is now producing an average of 460,000 ounces of gold a year.

A Harsh Environment That's Rich in Gold
The Sunrise Dam exists in a harsh dry physical environment. The area is vast and primarily exists of a flat arid landscape comprising dry salt pan lakes, gypsum rich sand dunes and a dry sandy soil that gives life to scattered acacia shrubs and trees that have somehow adapted to the long hot dry spells encountered for much of each and every year.

The mine has now been operating for 16 years (2013) as an open pit and an underground mine for 10 years. The entire operation is managed by contractors apart from the processing of the ore that is processed on site in a conventional carbon in leach (CIL) and gravity method which is owner managed. The processing plant was upgraded in 2009 to enable it to handle up to 3.9 million tonnes or ore a year.
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