Galan leaps up into the big leagues after HMW lithium resource more than doubles

Galan has cemented Hombre Muerto West’s position as a significant lithium project after more than doubling resources to 5.8Mt of contained lithium carbonate equivalent.

That this game-changing resource upgrade, which was driven by increased tenure scale and further drilling delivering increased aquifer size and porosity assays, was achieved while retaining the project’s high-grade, low impurity profile is testament to the project’s quality.

And if the increased size of the resource wasn’t enough of a boost, Galan Lithium (ASX:GLN) is also celebrating that the vast majority of the resource – 4.4Mt of contained lithium carbonate equivalent at a grade of 883mg/l lithium to be precise – is within the very high confidence Measured Resource category.

This is an achievement made all the more respectable by it being the first time a Measured Resource has been included for the HMW project.

It also allows the company to include the upgraded resource into the Definitive Feasibility Study, which is on track for delivery in the first quarter of 2023, with a great degree of confidence that its estimates will hold up during development.

“Even the Galan team has been amazed by the scale of this updated Resource for Hombre Muerto West. The outcome is game changing in terms of the step-up in the overall technical and economic potential of this world-class lithium brine asset,” managing director Juan Pablo Vargas de la Vega said.

“This is a function not only of the size of the increase in resource, but also the big step-up in confidence classification that has been achieved.

“This potential is now set to be incorporated into our ongoing Definitive Feasibility Study (DFS) work, which is on track for completion during Q1 2023.”

Resource upgrade

The HMW resource upgrade incorporates geological and geochemical information obtained from 15 drillholes totalling 4,384m within the Pata Pila, Rana de Sal, Casa del Inca and Del Condor tenements.

New porosity data was also obtained from 131 core samples derived from five holes at Pata Pila and Rana de Sal.

This allowed for the estimation of the new resource of over 5.8Mt lithium carbonate equivalent at 866mg/l lithium – well above the previous resource of 2.3Mt lithium carbonate equivalent at 946mg/l lithium.

No cut-off grade was applied as the minimum block grades of 620 mg/L Li exceeded the anticipated economic threshold, which reflects the highly homogenous brine quality throughout the tenements which permits the aggregation of the complete ore body and simplifies future operational, and process constrains.

Hombre Muerto West and next steps

The HMW project is located on the western shore of the Hombre Muerto Salar, a world-renowned lithium bearing salar located in the Argentinean Puna plateau region of the high Andes.

It covers a total of 7.5km of strike, up to 2.5km in width and depths of up to 719m.

Highlighting just how prospective the region is, HMW is adjacent to Livent Corporation, Allkem Limited and POSCO’s Sal de Vida projects.

With the DFS now planned for release in the first quarter of 2023, Galan noted that the numerical groundwater model is being prepared by SRK as a basis for the declaration of an Ore Reserve as part of this process.

Exploration, including drilling and pumping tests will continue during Q4 2022 to improve geological and hydrogeological understanding of the indicated resource areas and extend the resource to unexplored tenements (Santa Bárbara, Pucará del Salar and Catalina).

This will allow the company to declare further updates to the Resource estimate and Ore Reserve as part of the DFS.

This article was developed in collaboration with Galan Lithium, a Stockhead advertiser at the time of publishing.

This article does not constitute financial product advice. You should consider obtaining independent advice before making any financial decisions.