Numerous Baseline Studies Initiated For New Amalga Gold Project

VANCOUVER - Grande Portage Resources Ltd. reported that it is initiating comprehensive environmental & cultural baseline studies for the New Amalga Gold Project located approximately 16 miles (25 km) northwest of the city of Juneau.

Environmental Baseline Studies currently include the following: 1) Mapping the extent of wetlands and other jurisdictional waters in the project area is a key input for the design of mine facilities to minimize impacts to federally regulated wetland areas. This work will inform future Clean Water Act - Section 404 permitting with the US Army Corps of Engineers. 2) Continuation and expansion of a multi-year analysis of water quality both upstream and downstream of the potential mine facilities provides a pre-construction baseline for future Alaska Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (APDES) permitting. 3) Desktop database investigation to identify any documented archeological & cultural sites in proximity to the project is the initial step in complying with the Alaska Historic Preservation Act and informs future field surveys. 4) Collection of meteorological data including temperature, precipitation, wind direction and speed as well as hydrological data such as river flow volume is of key importance for the engineering design of mine infrastructure and provides important inputs to the Alaska Department of Conservation APDES and Air Quality Control permits. 5) Field surveys and sampling to document aquatic biological conditions in the project area are necessary to inform future ADF&G Fish Habitat Permits and other state and federal permits, as well as to support mine design protective of fish habitat and fish passage. This work will be conducted by the Alaska Dept of Fish & Game under contract with Grande Portage.

The Company's Conceptual Mining Plan envisions the development of the New Amalga gold mine as a selective underground mining operation which would send ore off-site to be processed at a third-party facility, enabled by the project's location near tidewater and less than 4 miles (6.5km) from existing paved highway (Fig 1). This setup results in the avoidance of any chemical processing or tailings storage facilities at the site.

Ian Klassen, President and CEO, said, "Offsite processing enables the project to have a dramatically minimized environmental footprint compared to a traditional setup which requires building a beneficiation plant and tailings storage facility. We will ultimately be demonstrating this through the environmental review and permitting process with state and federal regulatory agencies. The initiation of baseline studies is a critical early step in our work advancing the New Amalga project to become Alaska's next great gold mine."