Matt Birney

Middle Island Resources has identified new targets at the southern end of its Sandstone gold project in WA, which the gold explorer says indicates the area could host the densest clustering of gold deposits within the entire Sandstone greenstone belt. The targets lie within 2.5km of the company’s gold processing plant and significantly enhances the potential to contribute to a mill recommissioning decision.

Novo Resources has appointed two Perth-based technical consultants to examine development options for its East Pilbara gold assets, including the 900,000 ounce Beatons Creek conglomerate project near Nullagine in WA. The company has several prospective gold projects outside of Beatons Creek, including the Blue Spec gold-antimony deposit to the east and the under-explored Talga Talga deposit, located 35km north of Calidus Resources’ 1.25 million ounce Warrawoona gold project.

Rox Resources has completed due diligence of an expansive drilling database from the Youanmi gold project in the Murchison region of WA and confirmed a 1.2 million ounce gold mineral resource estimate for the mine area. The company last week entered into a deal with Venus Metals under which it has the right to acquire a majority position in the Youanmi gold mine.

MGC Pharmaceuticals has inked a deal with Chinese e-commerce import platform YuShop Global to sell the Perth-based company’s cannabis-based nutraceuticals into the Chinese market. The deal will see MGC Pharma’s products sold via YuShop’s online platform and network of 1,500 retail channel partners across China, including a luxury spa chain.

Infinity Lithium said that recent metallurgical test work studies completed on its San Jose lithium project in Spain have produced positive results and replicated the ore upgrades it achieved in 2018’s Scoping Study. In March, the company increased its ownership in San Jose to 75% and is now accelerating its PFS works for the project, which is on track for completion in June or July this year.

Rock chip sampling at Hammer Metals’ Mt Philp IOCG project near Mount Isa, Queensland, has returned up to 16% copper and 2.41g/t gold from the Mt Philp and Rangeview target areas and identified previously unrecognised bedrock mineralisation associated with soil anomalies. Sampling has also identified new prospects at the Kings, Alice and Deadlock areas in the Malbon region.

Altech Chemicals has raised $18m through a share placement to support the Stage 2 engineering and construction works for its high purity alumina plant in southern Malaysia. The company is planning to produce up to 4,500 tonnes annually of HPA at its Malaysian plant from very pure kaolin clays sourced from a shallow open pit mine near Meckering in WA, which has low levels of impurities.

Lithium Australia has confirmed the discovery of spodumene-bearing lithium mineralisation in multiple pegmatite dykes at its Medcalf prospect near Norseman, WA, that extend over at least 450m of strike and 100m of combined width. Samples up to 5.13% lithium oxide, with elevated levels of the pathfinder elements tantalum, caesium and rubidium were returned during the current program.

Venus Metals and Rox Resources have acquired a 90% stake in the historical high-grade Currans Find prospect located 5km from Spectrum Metals’ high-grade Penny West gold deposit in the Murchison region of WA. Historical records show that 6874 tons at an average grade of 13g/ton gold were treated from Currans Find, which has similar rock types to those that host the Penny West and nearby Columbia–Magenta deposits.

MGC Pharmaceuticals has received the green light to import its medicinal cannabis-based epilepsy drug CannEpil into the UK after it was awarded a controlled drug import licence permit. The permit allows the company to immediately expand distribution of CannEpil into the UK medicinal cannabis products market. It is also finalising negotiations with licensed distributors in the UK and Australia.

Buru Energy is preparing to kick off its 2019 drilling season in the Canning Basin in northern WA with the mobilisation of the NGD Loc 405 drill rig from Perth to its Ungani-6 horizontal oil production well, which is expected to spud in the first week of May. Work has also started on the drill pad for the Ungani-7 horizontal production well, which is located next to the existing Ungani-4 well.

Spectrum Metals has drilled additional wide, high-grade gold intersections at its Penny North gold prospect near Youanmi in WA. New intercepts included 6m @ 47.4g/t gold from 150m down-hole, located 40m down-plunge of March’s discovery hole and 11m @ 25.8g/t gold from 120m down-hole directly up-dip from the discovery hole. The company is raising $5m to support ongoing exploration and development at the emerging project.

Middle Island Resources has launched a formal takeover bid for Alto Metals, offering five of its shares for every Alto share, which could amalgamate the parties’ substantial Sandstone gold assets in WA. The addition of Alto’s gold resources could provide initial mill feed and critical mass to a combined entity with synergies that may potentially benefit the shareholders of both companies.

Calidus Resources has completed a review confirming that wide, surface outcropping gold mineralisation will be available from the start of any potential open pit operation at its Warrawoona gold project in the Pilbara, WA. The company is progressing exploration drilling to define additional resources in the broader project area and expects to complete a pre-feasibility study in the September quarter of 2019.

Bellevue Gold has unearthed three extensive, regional gold trends from a combination of historical data reviews and recent fieldwork adjacent to its 1.53 million ounce Bellevue gold resource located near Leinster, WA. The prospective structural corridors outlined at the Government Well, Bellevue North West and Bellevue West prospects are all set down for drill testing once regulatory approvals are in place.

Hot Chili has started its maiden RC drilling campaign at the large Cortadera copper-gold porphyry deposit located adjacent to its flagship Productora project in central Chile. The company said that drilling was progressing well, with all drill holes recording visual intersections of copper oxide and copper sulphide mineralisation. The first batch of samples have been dispatched for analysis and assays are expected in the coming weeks.

Buru Energy will soon gain a clearer understanding of the Butler conventional oil and gas prospect that straddles both its EP 129 and Rey Resources’ EP 487 in the Canning Basin, northern WA. London-based Doriemus, who is earning a 50% interest in Rey’s permit, is preparing to drill the Butler-1 well to test the gross unrisked mean prospective resources of 3.14Tcf of gas and 42 million barrels of associated condensate.

Small cap listed explorers Rox Resources and Venus metals have joined forces to breathe new life into the historic Youanmi gold mine in a deal that looks like a win win for both parties. With the gold price hovering at around AUD$400 an ounce in 1997, Youanmi was closed down with well over a million ounces still in the ground at good grades.

Northern Minerals has raised $10m via a placement to ramp up exploration and development activities at its high-grade Dazzler and Iceman prospects on the back of positive sentiment for the emerging rare earth sector. The company points to key commodity price increases and the recent unsolicited $1.5b takeover approach by Wesfarmers to rare earth producer Lynas Corporation, as evidence of an increased interest in the sector.

St George Mining has identified several strong new conductive drill targets from down-hole electromagnetic surveys at the Fairbridge, Cathedrals, West End, Investigators and Stricklands prospects of its Mt Alexander project in WA. Some of the conductors are located down-plunge from known massive sulphide lenses, which could represent extensions of the high-grade nickel-copper sulphide mineralisation.

Sky and Space Global is extending its reach with plans to provide global telco coverage using its constellation of nano-satellites instead of limiting itself to covering equatorial regions of the world. This will allow the company to meet the growing demand for IoT and M2M connectivity and target new markets such as Australia, China and Russia, which could potentially increase revenue.

Anglo Australian Resources has commenced RC drilling at its Koongie Park project near Halls Creek, WA, with holes targeting the Bulldog and Nicolsons East prospects where quartz vein outcrops have recorded high-grade gold values. The project has geology that is similar to Pantoro Limited’s neighbouring Nicolsons Gold Project, which currently produces about 55,000 ounces of gold per annum.

Azumah Resources has confirmed a substantial, mineralised gold system at the Bepkong East Lode in Ghana after returning high-grade intersections from multiple ore shoots up to 580m from the surface. Deeper intersections included 13.5m @ 3.21g/t gold from 480m down-hole and 2.5m @ 3.55g/t gold from 710.5m down-hole in separate drill holes. The company is now examining the economic merit of underground mining.

Anglo Australian Resources has outlined a maiden mineral resource of 2.86 million tonnes grading 1.3g/t gold for 116,100 gold ounces at its Feysville project, 14km from Kalgoorlie, WA. The new estimate is complemented by excellent metallurgical results for the deposit’s ores, which show a 99.5% recovery for the near-surface, supergene gold mineralisation that makes it ideal for potential toll milling options in the immediate area.

Alterra has appointed Future Fund Board of Guardians and Crown Resorts director John Poynton as the founding Chair of its advisory board, which will provide access to networks, strategic feedback, views on opportunities and risks, and introductions to potential deals and sources of capital. The company is developing a pipeline of potential project opportunities with existing land and water owners in WA.

Bosnian regulatory authorities have accepted Adriatic Metals’ “geological reserves” statement for its Rupice-Juraševac-Brestic project and provided a clearer path to the issue of Exploitation and Operating Permits for developing that deposit. The company continues drilling on four rigs to extend the high-grade mineralisation at the Rupice prospect and test priority targets outlined by technical data that show potential for discoveries.

TNG Ltd has started drilling at its flagship Mount Peake vanadium-titanium-iron project near Alice Springs in the Northern Territory to recover samples for equipment selection testwork. Sterilisation drilling will also be carried out to ensure that no mineralisation is present at the planned locations of the concentrator, ore stockpile and integrated waste landform ahead of future development activities.

Lithium Australia is acquiring an 18.9% interest in Victoria-based Envirostream, which operates Australia’s only facility for shredding lithium-ion batteries into a powder containing critical metals. The company is looking to prevent this powder from being exported for refining by developing a process to extract the valuable nickel, cobalt, manganese and lithium compounds locally.

Hawkstone Mining has generated wide, high-grade mineralisation in two separate ore horizons from drilling at the Northern Mineralised Zone of its Big Sandy lithium clay project in Arizona, US. Better results include 23.3m @ 2,154 ppm lithium from 6.7m down-hole in the Upper Zone and 35m @ 2,078 ppm lithium from 31m down-hole in the Lower Zone, for the same vertical drill hole.

Black Rock Mining’s Chinese EPC partner Yantai Jinyaun has generated high quality, large flake dominant, graphite concentrates exceeding 99% purity at 93% recovery from pilot plant studies on the company’s Tanzanian Mahenge ores. The work was observed by offtake partners and potential investors and completed to validate the company’s optimised circuit design and processing flowsheets.

Classic Minerals has narrowed its focus to the very prospective Forrestania gold project near Southern Cross in WA, which includes the emerging, high-grade Kat Gap project. The company is in discussions with regard to financing for an exploration program to better delineate and potentially increase the size of the Kat Gap project. It has also flagged its intention to divest its non-core assets.

Artemis Resources has defined three new gravity targets at its greenfields Armada prospect in the Paterson Range copper-gold province in the eastern Pilbara. The company now has 11 potential targets to act as a drawcard as it searches for a potential joint venture partner to undertake further exploration near Greatland Gold’s spectacular Havieron copper-gold discovery.