Olympic Gold from Knelson

Langley, BC; Canada
Vancouver and Whistler hosted the 2010 Winter Olympic Games from February 12th to 28th and Knelson played a unique, behind the scenes role in the production of the gold used in the Winter Games Gold medals. The gold used in the medals was supplied by three of Teck's North American operations; the Pogo Gold Mine near Fairbanks, Alaska, USA; the Hemlo Gold Mine near Marathon, Ontario, Canada; and the Trail Smelter in British Columbia, Canada.
Knelson Concentrators are in service at both the Pogo Mine and the Hemlo Mine where they are used to recover free-milling gold from the ore.

Gold doré bars from these mines (approximately 87.5% "pure") were then chemically refined at Teck's Trail Smelter into gold grains at 99.99% purity - the highest purity of gold. The grains were then transformed into an electrolyte solution for gold plating, which places a layer of gold over a silver base (Olympic gold medals are approximately 92.5% silver). The electrolyte solution was sent to the Royal Canadian Mint for medal production.

As fate would have it, in 2010 Canadian Athletes set a new Winter Games record, winning 14 Gold medals each containing a small amount of gold that was recovered by a Canadian made Knelson Concentrator.