• Late 1800’s: discovered by local ranchers
• 1884-1934: the French smelted a total of approximately 13 million tonnes of copper ore grading 5%
•  1935-1984: sporadic and uneconomic production attempts
• 1992: staked by current management
• Mid 1990’s: optioned to International Curator
  • Curator spent $23 million in exploration & technical development
• 2001: reverted back to current management

On April 20, 2004, Baja Mining Corp. (The “Company”) concluded the reverse takeover (“RTO”) of Mintec International Corporation, of Barbados, and consequently its wholly owned Mexican subsidiary Minera y Metalugica del Boleo S.A. de  C.V. (“MMB”). MMB holds a 100% interest in the Boleo Copper-Cobalt-Zinc deposit on the Baja Peninsula, Mexico.  Contemporaneous with the RTO we also concluded a $10 million equity placement.

Boleo Property was an historic copper mine in Mexico – Mining approximately 19 million tonnes of copper ore at an average grade of approximately 4.3% copper (of which the majority was hand sorted producing 13.2 million tonnes during the period 1886-1947 averaged 4.81% copper) during the period 1868 to 1972. Previous operators were unable to concentrate the minerals contained within the ore and accordingly the ore was direct smelted, accounting for the requirement for the high grade ore and resulting in material grading less than 3% copper either not being mined or backfilled in mined areas. No attempt was made to recover the contained cobalt or zinc (or other potential valuable constituents). Since 1992 approximately US$25 million has been spent on the Boleo Property to assess reserves and to develop modern techniques for the processing of the ore to extract the contained copper-cobalt –zinc, culminating in the issuance of a pre-feasibility study by by Batemen Engineering Pty Limited, of Perth, Western Australia, in February 2002 (the “Bateman Study”).

The Bateman Study focuses on the utilization of relatively new solid liquid separation technology (which is currently being successfully used at three operations with comparable or greater clay content) to separate metal enriched leach solutions from the clayey gangue material, resulting in a significantly simpler and more cost effective flow sheet for the recovery of metal. The current equity financing will now allow the Company to proceed to pilot plant (approx 8 months) the flowsheet. Completion of a successful pilot plant removes the majority of technical risk from the project and is the key component of a final feasibility study.

The Bateman Study, relying on previous studies, contemplated mining a portion of the defined mineral resources at Boleo as an open pit mine. The ore beds at Boleo have many similarities with coal seams and accordingly, current management proposes as part of the Feasibility Study to investigate the use of continuous mining machines to extract material from an underground operation. It is anticipated that because of the relatively high strip ratio (tonnes of waste to tonnes of ore) in the proposed open pit that underground mining costs will be comparable to open pit costs, however the grade of underground resources is significantly higher than proposed open pit resources, resulting in substantially improved economics.

Management has retained Bateman to complete a detailed scoping study to finalize the requirements for a Final Feasibility Study and it is anticipated that Bateman will be retained to complete such study. Bateman’s project manager has completed an initial site visit to the Boleo Property as well as conducting meetings with prospective local  (Mexico City) consultants to assist in, among other things, environmental permitting. A decision will be made by management, kin consultation with Bateman, in the next month on the location of the Pilot Plant.

In addition, to proceeding to commence the Final Feasibility Study, management have applied for the necessary permits to commence an exploratory drill program in a potentially new geological basin,  the Montado Basin.

Economic studies to date by the Company have utilized long term metal prices of US$0.80 per pound for Copper, US$8.00 per pound for Cobalt, and US$0.45 per pound for zinc. While we will continue to use conservative pricing for the Final Feasibility Study, should metal prices remain at current levels it would obviously have a significant positive impact on project economics.

We look forward to an exciting year as we proceed with the initial phases of the Final Feasibility Study on the Boleo Property, the drilling of the Montado Basin and other as yet unannounced new developments.