Modeling cumulative availability curve of gold resources

The article presents the authors’ approach to evaluation of economic availability of mineral resources. The approach uses the cumulative availability curves plotted for certain minerals, which is a common way of solving such problems abroad. The curves represent the cumulative volumes of mineral resources at the deposits ranked in the sequence from the best to the worst versus the estimated cost of the mineral product. These costs should cover all expenses connected with mining and thus provide a zero net present value of extraction of certain mineral resources. The curves imply that as deposits having the worst mining conditions and containing low-quality minerals are involved in the development, the estimated costs increase. The cost calculation of is a very time-consuming process, and the main difficulty is the cost estimation of mineral mining and processing. The authors propose an approach to modeling the unit costs of mineral mining and processing depending on the deposit development probabilities estimated for a set of mineral bodies of the same genetic type. Using the developed cost estimation models and the information from the US Geological Survey on mineral resources, the cumulative availability curves are plotted for primary gold deposits in the world. On this basis, the forecast rates of the increase in the mineable mineral resources are compared with the rates of the increment in the costs of their development, and the express-appraisal of economically available resources is done.