The company has plans to start production at the Vermelhos underground project in Bahia in the December quarter of 2018, and currently has four drill rigs on site trying to confirm the ore it plans to mine.

 

The latest infill drilling as part of the 7,500m programme scheduled this year saw the company hit a 20m interval grading 12.21% Cu from 142.1m depth and a 22m length averaging 9.6% Cu from 132.4m depth.

 

Both rank among the top-five intercepts, on a grade-metre basis, drilled to date at the project.

 

The development is going well judging by the latest update. Through October, around 1,167m of underground development has been completed, with construction of phase one surface infrastructure finished and phase two progressing on schedule.

 

Ero is already producing copper from its Pilar operation, part of its MCSA complex, but expects to move from output of 19,000t in 2017 to 53,100t in 2021 through the development of Vermelhos.