Video News/Investment Trends

Tocvan Ventures (CSE: TOC) is advancing its Gran Pilar gold-silver project in Sonora, Mexico, combining exploration drilling with a permitted pilot mining operation aimed at demonstrating heap leach production potential. Speaking with Kitco Mining at PDAC 2026, CEO Brodie Sutherland said the company spent three years consolidating the land package around a discovery first drilled by the Lundin Group in 1996. “We negotiated a deal to expand that property to 22 square kilometers,” Sutherland said, noting the company can now drill across the entire project area. Tocvan has drilled close to 18,000 meters at Gran Pilar over the past five years and plans a minimum 20,000 meters in 2026 while advancing a pilot facility permitted to process an initial 50,000 tons of material. The company completed a 1,500 ton bulk sample in 2023 grading 1.9 g/t gold and continues metallurgical work ahead of pilot operations planned later this year. “We’re getting over 95% recovery of gold,” Sutherland said, referring to lab-scale tests supporting the heap leach concept as the company works toward defining a maiden resource.