Cementation Skanska’s turnkey engineering design and construction capabilities have won a £22m contract to construct a 2200-metre deep shaft for Goldcorp at the Red Lake Mine in Ontario, Canada.
The project, at the world’s highest-grade gold producing mine, is one of the largest shaft construction projects in North America. It follows Cementation Skanska’s initial contract to carry out the shaft’s detailed engineering, including designing its headframe and surface facilities.
Work starts in the next two months to excavate the shaft collar and build the surface support infrastructure, including the headframe and hoist building, with construction of the shaft starting before the end of the year.
When completed in late 2006, it will become Red Lake Mine’s main production shaft, raising capacity to 4000 tonnes each day and enabling a 45 per cent increase in gold production to 740,000 ounces a year.
The award positions Cementation Skanska as Canada’s leading shaft-sinking contractor following the contract awarded last year to construct a 1,906 metre deep access shaft at Kidd Mine, also in Ontario.
Cementation Skanska’s managing director Stewart Keeble said, “Our combined design and construction capabilities and our shaft sinking approach enabled us to develop a work schedule to meet Goldcorp’s timescales. Goldcorp is a new client and we are very excited to be working with one of the mining industry’s leading companies.”