Revised Final Environmental Study Report (24 MB) - Gold Canyon ...

Gold Canyon Resources Inc.
Springpole Gold Access Corridor Project
Final Environmental Study Report
Executive Summary
This Environmental Study Report (“Report”) is required pursuant to MNR (2003) for the Springpole
Gold Access Corridor Project (“Project”). Gold Canyon Resources Inc. (“GCU”) is the sole
proponent for this Project and is currently seeking to further define the significant gold resource at
the Springpole Gold Project in a safe, timely and cost-effective manner so that a comprehensive
economic evaluation can be completed during the current period of strong gold prices.
This Report summarizes the processes that GCU has undertaken to comply with the requirements
of MNR (2003) for a Category C environmental assessment.
Land Use
The use of the lands within and adjoining the Springpole Property (“Property”) is generally
wilderness / recreation, tourism and natural resource extraction (i.e. mineral development, remote
tourism, forestry). The Property is located in the Trout Lake Forest Sustainable Forest License
area and has been subject to a great deal of preliminary exploration activities on an intermittent
basis since the 1920s. This historic exploration activity has resulted in a network of exploration
trails and minor disturbance in the region due to diamond drilling, linecutting, trenching and
surface stripping. Domtar currently holds the SFL for the Trout Lake Forest and is active in the
region. The planned extension of the Wenasaga Road, scheduled to be constructed in the 2014-
2019 timeline according to the 2009-2019 Trout Lake Forest Management Plan (“FMP”), traverses
the southeast portion of the Property.
Environmental Setting and Site Description
Through extensive biological and archaeological assessment work under direct participation of
First Nation technicians, GCU has generally defined the locations of biological and archaeological
values. GCU has planned the proposed Project to avoid these sensitive areas.
The region is within the Churchill Caribou range and the area is subject to management for
woodland caribou.
Project Objective and Justification
The Project is intended to provide safe, reliable, year-round, land-based access to the area of the
Deposit (via highway and/or off-road vehicles). This improved access is required for the reasons
listed in the bullets below.
Facilitate on-going site infrastructure improvements and the necessary exploration and
resource definition work on the Springpole Gold Project to support a timely economic
evaluation of the Deposit during the current cycle of strong gold prices.
Improve safety and emergency response capabilities. Unfortunately, injuries and fatalities
on ice roads are commonplace throughout Canada. The GCU team incurred a fatality in
2005 when a piece of heavy equipment fell through the ice road over Birch Lake (ice road
shown on Figures 1-1 and 2-1). As well, air access cannot always be relied upon due to
weather. In the event of a critical injury, reliable land-based access is required to ensure
that the casualty is safely moved as quickly as possible to hospital care as opposed to
being weathered in at GCU’s camp on the north shore of Springpole Lake (refer to Figure
2-1).
The proposed Project is a subset of the Springpole Gold (resource definition) Project.
Therefore, the Project is aligns with provincial government objectives related to supporting
July 2013
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