Pic: Via Getty
Mining
Here are biggest small cap resources winners in early trade, Thursday December 15.
A rock sampling program has returned grades of up to 122,497g/t gold and 23,234g/t silver at Birdsnest, part of PGD Newman project in WA.
Yep, you read right. That’s equivalent to 120kg of gold for every tonne of dirt moved.
This style of mineralisation requires “precise surgical diamond drilling to resolve continuity in 3D or down plunge”, technical director George Merhi says.
It’s the latest in a string on impressive gold hits at Newman, which include this spectacular chunk in drill core at its Peninsula prospect:
In fact, there’s gold all over the joint, they say, just sitting at surface.
“It is very rare for a greenfield exploration program in WA to encounter mineralisation of this nature sitting undisturbed at surface,” PGD technical director George Merhi says.
Diamond drilling at both Birdsnest and Peninsula will start in Q1 2023.
SRN says Victory Bore is shaping up as a “world class vanadium deposit” after drilling defined three thick and consistent lodes at the WA project.
Initial drilling results have returned widths of up to 92m @ 0.41% vanadium pentoxide (V2O5).
The three distinct parallel mineralised lodes up to 56m, 38m and 60m wide greatly increasing potential for a significantly larger resource, managing director Vladimir Nikolaenko says.
“The drilling results from Victory Bore display huge true widths, exceptional continuity both along strike and down dip, which are ideal for bulk mining,” he says.
“Based on these results, Victory Bore is shaping up to be a world class vanadium deposit.”
There are more results to come.
Once all assays have been received, SRN will update the resource ahead of a project prefeasibility study.
Victory Bore/Unaly Hill currently hosts a resource of 237Mt @ 0.43% V2O5, 24.9% Fe, and 5.9% TiO2.
At present, the resource is equivalent to a contained 2.26 billion pounds, or 1,009,000 tonnes of vanadium.
The Victory Bore deposit has an additional Exploration Target of 150Mt-200Mt @ 0.4%-0.7% V2O5.
(Up on no news)
Sprott-backed KZR has gold and lithium projects at various stages of exploration and development in WA, Victoria and NSW.
The 1.6Moz (and growing) Ashburton project in the Pilbara is its most advanced, with an updated resource estimate due out in the current quarter, alongside a project scoping study.
Meanwhile, drilling was completed last quarter across the Dom’s Hill and Marble Bar lithium projects (~4,000m) and the Mallina West gold project (2,500m), also in the Pilbara.
The best result from Mallina West reconnaissance-style drilling – cut short by bad weather — was 1m @ 10.35g/t gold from 99m.
“Although our maiden drill program at Mallina West was cut short by unseasonal wet weather, the end of hole intersection of 1m @ 10.35g/t Au in KAMRC0016 is not only intriguing but also highly encouraging,” KZR exec director Paul Adams said mid-November.
“We know that we are in the right neighbourhood with De Grey’s 10Moz Hemi discovery to the northeast and we are looking forward to getting back on the ground in the upcoming field season.”
GRL has bolstered its rare earths exploration portfolio, picking up some new ground in NSW and QLD.
The Bingara project in the New England region of NSW has similar geological/geophysical ‘signatures’ to the Australian Strategic Metals (ASX:ASM) Toongi prospect near Dubbo.
No historic or recent exploration for REEs has been completed in the area, “which makes it an exciting new addition to GRL’s REE portfolio”, the company says.
Several targets have already been identified across the tenement and will be prioritised in the early phases of the exploration program.
The Eidsvold project in QLD was identified using similar assessment methodologies as to the process completed for NSW.
“The decision to pursue the licences followed a thorough review of REE exploration potential in NSW and QLD, using publicly available geological databases for both states,” managing director Jeneta Owens says.
“By using the exploration criteria of known deposits and applying this to open ground, we have been able to identify these priority target areas and we are looking forward to commencing REE exploration on both tenements.
“Work will start on the NSW tenement in Q1 CY2023 and we look forward to providing ongoing updates as exploration commences.”
(Up on no news)
Iron ore is back, tentatively, with prices for benchmark 62% fe now pushing through $US110/t.
The longer term outlook is also good for the higher grade iron ore companies, with the expectation that green steelmaking technologies in the future will favour higher grade ores and concentrates.
AKO says its ‘Bekisopa’ project in Madagascar is shaping up “as one of the highest-grade iron ore projects in the world”.
A recently completed scoping study was light on detail, but did show Bekisopa “to have high potential for further study due to its high grades, low impurities, positive processing characteristics and robust economics”.
“We are very pleased to have completed the Scoping Study for Bekisopa,” AKO managing director Paul Bibby said in November.
“The Study confirms viable pathways to production with robust project economics and provides knowledge that positions AKORA to move to a Pre-Feasibility Study, subject to funding, on the Bekisopa DSO in 2023.”
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