A Wesfarmers-controlled producer of sodium cyanide is keen for another output boost at its Kwinana manufacturing plant amid booming demand from gold miners for the deadly chemical compound.

Australian Gold Reagents, which is owned 75 per cent by Wesfarmers and the remainder by Coogee Chemicals, has lodged an application with the WA Government to expand its liquid and solid sodium cyanide production capacity from 170,000 tonnes per annum to 210,000tpa.

Sodium cyanide is commonly used to leach gold from mined ore by dissolving the crushed rock to release specks of the precious metal contained within.

Manufacturing sodium cyanide is a complicated and highly-regulated process because ingesting just one-eighth of a teaspoon worth of the chemical compound can be fatal. AGR’s Kwinana complex i

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