From a technical perspective, combining LC and LB does have a number of obvious advantages.

1. Both could be processed with a single mill, and other facilities could be combined saving capital and operating costs.

2. LB is a very large single pit of lower grade than the multiple pits of LC. The ore types are actually quite similar but the proportions of hard rock to saprolite differs significantly as does the gold and copper percentages in each type. Saprolite is rather more difficult to handle especially in wet weather. However mining both concurrently would allow for better ore blending to enable more utilization of lower grade ores and easier processing in a wider range of weather conditions.

3. While much of the LC ore contains little copper some of it does contain economic quantities and this would be able to be recovered.

4. It would be possible to mine out one of the smaller LC pits and then use that as a disposal pit for further tailings and waste rock. Thus the total tailings storage would be significantly reduced as each exhausted pit in turn became the repository for the current active mining. Over the life of the mine there would be a large saving in costs and the environmental footprint would be significantly reduced.

5. Dewatering could be better managed with a single operation.

6. Management costs and overheads would be lower.

7. Total metal production (considering gold plus gold equivalent from copper) from a single mill of 70k tpd (in line with the GRZ plan) would be almost the same as the two mill design with a mine life of around 30 years.

Of course this all assumes a co-operative approach from all parties, KRY, GRZ, CVG and the various Ven ministries as well as Hugo himself, so I'm not hanging about holding my breath waiting for it to happen!