Troilus Gold Corp. announced that it has filed the Initial Project Description for the Troilus Project with the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada at the Federal level and the Project Notice with the Ministère de l'Environnement et de la Lutte contre les Changements Climatiques at the Quebec Provincial level. The filing of the Initial Project Description and the Project Notice are the first step in the Environmental and Social Impact Assessments, approval of which are required under Canadian and Quebec law in order for a mining project to proceed to construction and into production.

The ESIA assesses the environmental, social and economic impacts of a proposed mining project and includes extensive consultations with local stakeholders, and in particular First Nations. At the Federal level, the filing of the Initial Project Notice marks the start of the “Planning Phase”, during which the IAAC will invite members of the public and Indigenous peoples to provide comment on the focus and priorities of the ESIA and contribute to planning. The Planning Phases is expected to take 180 days to complete and will result in a set of guidelines for Troilus to follow in preparing the ESIA.

At the Provincial level, MELCC will refer the Initial Project Notice to le Comité d'évaluation des répercussions sur l'environnement et le milieu social to assess the Project's impact and provide guidelines for the ESIA, which are expected within 30 days. Since approval is required at both the federal and provincial level, Troilus will essentially be running a concurrent dual assessment process which will result in two ESIA reports to address the concerns and priorities at each level of government.