Cal- Good insights, as always. I missed the part about the flotation unit producing 800 tons instead of 3000 tons- nice catch. One thing, though- I do think that the flotation units will produce smeltable material. It won't be nearly as concentrated as what would (will?) result from the leach circuit, but it can be smelted. After all, they have been smelting what they get out of the gravity circuit.

There are some basic differences in the leach and flotation products, though. The flotation product will have a lot of silver that can't be recovered without using flux during smelting, and I'm not sure they have permits for that. I think much of the silver will remain in the slag- probably the reason the dore is only about 2:1 silver:gold, when the ore is more like 10:1 or more. I assume they are saving the slag for later recovery of silver. The leach system should get out the silver much more efficiently. The leach product will be much more concentrated, with minimal waste. Smelting will be much more efficient, since much smaller total quantities will have to be smelted, so fewer total batches. But in the meantime, they should be able to smelt and produce revenue. They don't have to wait for the leach system to be installed.