Grades up to 19g/t gold confirm Awak Mas’ development potential

Special Report: Close spaced drilling at Nusantara’s (ASX:NUS) 1.5moz Awak Mas gold deposit, designed to de-risk the project before construction, is hitting numerous broad zones up to 43m thick and individual high grades up to 19g/t.

Nusantara Resources is pushing to finalise debt finance this year for the ~127,000oz per year Awak Mas gold project in Indonesia, ahead of construction in 2021 and first commissioning in 2022.

A close spaced drilling program currently underway over the Initial Mining Area (IMA), will help the company define a maiden higher confidence ‘measured’ resource in early 2021.

This will help de-risk the project toward obtaining development funding.

It’s also an opportunity to test newly discovered higher-grade vertical gold zones that are prevalent within the project, which could add to reserves and extend and improve the existing pits.

The Initial Mining Area (IMA) comprises starter pits at Tanjung and Mapacing which are geological domains within the greater Awak Mas deposit, as well as at the Salu Bulo satellite deposit.

The Rante area is not presently included in the IMA but could be brought forward under an expanded mining scenario.

New close spaced drilling at Rante has hit broad ore zones and high grades, confirming the productive nature of the geology at Awak Mas:

Plan view showing close spaced drilling areas (Rante, Tanjung and Mapacing, and Salu Bulo) and planned exploration drilling.

Rante drilling highlights included 5m at 7.18 g/t gold from 17m (including 1m at 19g/t) and 21m at 2.4g/t from 27m (including 1m at 8.99g/t).

Individual high grades up to 19 g/t gold are interpreted to occur within those sub-vertical “feeder” structures.

Several new feeders are interpreted to have been intersected by this drilling program, Nusantara says.

Diamond drilling is now underway at Tanjung and will move to Mapacing, and then to Salu Bulo.

A third and fourth drilling rig are also being sourced so Nusantara can finish drilling by end of January 2021.

Following the completion of close spaced drilling, Nusantara will test shallow targets neighbouring the Salu Bulo planned pit that have the potential to add near surface, high grade ounces.

“Early drilling results yielding up to 43m of gold mineralisation, intervals of 8m at 6.69 g/t, 5m at 7.18 g/t and exceptional grades of up to 19g/t and 15.64g/t are outstanding,” Nusantara managing director Neil Whitaker says.

“We will be drilling for much of the rest of 2020, targeting areas that are expected to provide the first two years of production, as well as areas that could be brought forward under expanded production scenarios, as we advance toward Final Investment Decision for the Awak Mas gold project.”

This story was developed in collaboration with Nusantara, a Stockhead advertiser at the time of publishing.

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