They have known how to recover the gold and silver fore 140 years. Leaching That was known. They had to prove that there was no other way. I have family up there the locals were dead set against the use of chemicals if there was another way. Rodger planed this system for SFMI. They knew all along that it was a long shot but it was the road they had to take. No big miner would be interested in a mountain full of gold they could not recover.