Energy: Marenica picks up Australian uranium tenements, doubles resource

Marenica Energy (ASX:MEY) has powered up its uranium resources after acquiring a suite of tenements in the Northern Territory and Western Australia from Optimal Mining.

The acquisition of the Angela, Thatcher Soak and Oobagooma projects as well as stakes in the Bigrlyi, Malawiri, Walbiri and Areva joint ventures add 48 million pounds of uranium grading 859 parts per million (ppm) to the company’s existing 61-million-pound-resource at its 75 per cent-owned Marenica project in Namibia.

Naturally, the uranium resources are expected to be amenable to the company’s proprietary U-pgrade beneficiation process that could significantly reduce development costs compared to its peers with similar grade ores.

“The counter-cyclical purchase of these high-grade uranium resources in Australia … doubles our mineral resources,” managing director Murray Hill said.

“In addition, Marenica has had a successful 2019, with excellent drilling results at Koppies with grades of up to 4,504ppm uranium, identification of two palaeochannels at Koppies with one measuring 3.6 km by 1.2 km and a successful program of acquiring strategically located tenements in Namibia.”

Now read:
Uranium hits power up Marenica’s Namibian project

Meanwhile, fellow uranium player Deep Yellow (ASX:DYL) has intersected additional uranium mineralisation below the near-surface Red Sand deposit at its Reptile project in Namibia.

Best intersections from the recently completed program include 8m at 444ppm uranium and 3m at 685ppm uranium.

Drilling also delineated new zones for future resource infill drilling within this part of the main Tumas channel.

“It is highly encouraging that the latest exploration results which has extended testing to the west continues to produce positive results delineating further uranium mineralisation,” managing director John Borshoff said.

“There is a strong expectation that Tumas will reward the company with additional uranium resources, as we continue to evaluate and test the remaining 55km of the channel system.”

Now read:
Deep Yellow shines with uranium resource upgrade

In other ASX energy news today:

Whitebark Energy (ASX:WBE) is due for some pre-Christmas celebrations after the Rex-3 well at its Wizard Lake project in Alberta outperformed its previous wells. Rex-3 flowed 1,084 barrels of oil and 1.16 million cubic feet of gas per day during a two day test.

Oil and gas explorers in the Perth Basin will be upgrading their prospects once again after mid-cap player Beach Energy (ASX:BPT) flowed up to 46 million cubic feet of gas per day from its Beharra Springs Deep-1 well in the Perth Basin.

The flow test of the Kingia Sandstone reservoir – the same reservoir that flowed gas from Strike Energy’s (ASX:STX) West Erregulla-2 well in October – was constrained by the tubing size.