Matt Birney

Helped by rising oil prices, Buru Energy has tabled its record price for an oil shipment yet, bringing in about $5.7 million from its 50 per cent share in 76,000 barrels of crude from its joint venture Ungani oilfield near Broome in WA. The shipment by a tanker through Wyndham port raked in $1 million above the company’s previous high in February.

Podium Minerals has confirmed the presence of high-value rhodium and iridium in its maiden drilling campaign for platinum group metals at Parks Reef in WA as the company pushes towards production. Shallow drill results were headlined by 27m at 2.34 g/t 5E PGM from 9m including 7m grading 6.11 g/t from 17m. 5E PGM represents a combination of platinum, palladium, gold, rhodium and iridium.

Oil producer Triangle Energy has navigated an evolving commodity landscape, locking away $13.8 million in cash at the end of June – a leap of more than $11 million above its previous quarter. Oil revenue from its Cliff Head JV was $21.3 million for the period, courtesy of 148,000 barrels of oil sold. Receipts from customers leapt to $12.6 million up from zero in the March quarter.

Empire Energy has finished the June quarter in a strong financial position after locking in more than $3 million in sales, a successful $27.5 million capital raise and almost $5.5 million in exploration grants. The ASX-listed oil and gas company closed the financial year with more than $45 million in the tin, with the goal of becoming the first commercial producer in Northern Territory's Beetaloo sub-basin.

JV partners DiscovEx Resources and Carnaby Resources have added another riveting chapter to the duo’s Queensland copper story, with the explorers intersecting 110m of visual sulphide mineralisation at the base of a hole at their Lady Fanny South prospect. The exploration target was defined last month through an induced polarisation survey and forms part of the larger Greater Duchess project near Mt Isa.

The latest round of diamond drilling at Legend Mining’s Mawson nickel, copper and cobalt discovery in Western Australia’s Fraser Range has hauled in massive nickel sulphides from a suite of prospective host rocks. A drilling program is chasing up a swag of valuable targets identified from a recently completed detailed 3D seismic survey that covered a 6.5 square kilometre area of the prospect.

Lithium Australia subsidiary Envirostream has added more than 100 spent battery collection sites across the nation after signing a battery recycling services agreement with Battery World Australia. The deal allows Envirostream to collect spent lithium batteries from Battery World’s 110 franchises nationally. The latest partnership gives Envirostream access to more than 800 collection points throughout Australia after similar collaborations with retailers such as Bunnings and Officeworks.

Strickland Metals has been named the manager of the Iroquois zinc-lead project in Western Australia’s Earaheedy Basin after the company completed a formal joint venture agreement with Gibb River Diamonds. The new joint venture supersedes an historical option agreement from 2012. Strickland says a native title heritage survey will be requested for next month. The company is planning a 5000m drilling program with a further 5000m in the works, subject to positive results.

Ora Banda Mining’s strategy to simplify mining, raise plant efficiency, cut costs and improve cash generation has stabilised performance and delivered a timely boost as the company heads into the new financial year. The June quarterly report has marked the first time the gold producer has delivered a positive cash flow since inception. The $3.8 million net operating position came on the back of the sale of 15,060 ounces of gold during the period.

Panther Metals has started follow-up drilling at Burtville East, near Laverton WA, as it looks to replicate its bonanza gold grades from its first six RC drill holes. The initial campaign returned spectacular results including 15m at 53.9 g/t gold and 1m intervals up to 478 g/t gold. The new drilling program aims to provide detailed geological information on the earlier bonanza-gold intercepts, test for strike extensions and the potential for further stacked lodes.

Air-core drilling at Meeka Metals’ Circle Valley rare earths project has delivered a new benchmark with the latest results running up to 2245 parts per million total rare earths oxides near Esperance in WA. Importantly, the figures have swelled the mineralised footprint at the operation and highlighted its potential for both a larger scale and higher grade.

Conico has kicked off another round of drilling at its Ryberg project in Greenland, targeting platinum group elements and gold at the company’s Cascata site and multi-metals at its Sortekap prospect. Drilling is also about to start at Mestersvig, Conico’s other Greenland project, with all personnel and equipment on site. Field investigations at several new Ryberg prospects are also at the planning stage having been identified from aero-magnetic surveys completed last year.

Globe Metals and Mining is teaming up with industry partners to fine-tune the extractive technologies needed to treat high-purity niobium pentoxide and tantalum concentrates from its Kanyika project in Malawi. In addition to producing niobium and tantalum oxides, the company is investigating a second processing technology as it looks to open up the lucrative ferro-niobium market.

West Perth-based Meeka Metals has been buoyed by initial metallurgical testing at its Circle Valley project that show high extraction rates of high-value magnet rare earths as it presses to commercialise its discoveries in WA’s south. The tests reveal total rare earths extraction averaged 76 per cent and the magnet rare earths leached up to 86 per cent extraction with a mean of 82 per cent.

Follow-up diamond drilling by Toro Energy at its recently discovered Jumping Jack deposit in WA’s north-eastern Goldfields has intersected more massive and semi-massive nickel sulphides. The company says spot analysis using X-ray fluorescence suggests a range of between 1.28 and 3.5 per cent nickel from a 2.3m intersection from 232.1m. Its follow-up hole was drilled about 18m east of where the initial Jumping Jack discovery was made earlier this month.

Brightstar Resources air-core drilling has yielded anomalous gold results at its Rowena, Jubilee and Sailor Prince historical gold mines. The old mines near Laverton in WA form part of the company’s Brightstar South project. The best result was 1m at 4.85 g/t gold at the Sailor Prince prospect with the 500m-long gold lode being aligned with the old workings.

Javelin Minerals has picked up some intriguing hints of mineralisation only 5km west from where ASX-listed Ramelius Resources operated its successful Coogee West mining operation which produced more than 20,000 ounces of gold at an impressive head grade of 4.7 g/t gold. Importantly, Javelin says the characteristics from the latest mineralisation it has encountered bear similar characteristics to what Ramelius was able to turn into a operating mine less than 10 years ago.

Asra Minerals has amassed an extra 2456 hectares of prime real estate at its flagship Mt Stirling multi-commodity project in Western Australia’s eastern Goldfields. The 13 freshly minted tenements abut Mt Stirling’s southern block and take in a further 4km strike of the prospective Arktos Fault that hosts the company’s emerging Yttria and Wishbone rare earths and critical minerals discoveries.

American West Metals could be onto a shallow, high-grade copper at its Storm project in Canada after unveiling strong visual mineralisation from the company’s first two diamond holes at the operation. The explorer launched the probe at a highly prospective area known as “2750N” where historical intercepts include 110m at 2.45 per cent copper from surface and 3.07 per cent copper from 12.2m.

Okapi Resources has intersected multiple zones of elevated sulphide mineralisation in two diamond holes at its Sunnyside prospect, part of its fully owned Enmore gold project in the New England region of NSW. Its campaign follows a 2021 probe that delivered a suite of notable hits including 1m at 15.15 grams per tonne gold from 172m inside a monster 174m intercept grading 1.83 g/t gold from surface.

Globe Metals and Mining is one step closer to sealing a mining development deal for its Kanyika niobium project with the Malawi Government after a review and recommendation for approval by a steering committee. The company says it has received confirmation from the Malawi Ministry of Mining that negotiations and the review of the draft agreement have been completed. Globe is aiming to produce high-purity niobium pentoxide and tantalum at Kanyika.

Metal Hawk has launched a diamond drilling program at its Kanowna East project in the West Australian Goldfields region as it looks to chase up a raft of shallow nickel hits struck by a previous explorer. The multi-hole campaign will be steered by JV partner IGO and will test southern extensions of the nearby Silver Swan nickel sulphide deposit.

Podium Minerals continues to extend its Parks Reef platinum group metals deposit in WA’s Mid West region, with assays from an additional 4 RC holes sunk as part of its stage 10 drilling program delivering solid intercepts including 14m at 1.65 grams per tonne three-elements platinum-group metals from 133m. The results show the miner has intersected the operation’s mineral-laden orebody every time it has fired up the drill rig.

Smart home technology company Zimi has seen record device pairings in three of the last four months which the company says shows an accelerated market adoption as it prepares to launch into an adjacent smoke detection market. Zimi estimates the global smoke detector market will grow to about US$3 billion in five years.

Junior explorer DiscovEx Resources has improved the prospectivity of its Spartan gold anomaly after a phase 2 infill and extensional soil sampling program added results up to 544 parts per billion gold. The target sits inside the larger Edjudina project about 250km north-east of Kalgoorlie in Western Australia.

An interim mineralogical report from the University of Queensland on Asra Minerals’ Yttria deposit at its Mt Stirling project in WA’s eastern goldfields has confirmed the heavy rare earths discovery is suitable for low-cost processing. The company says its initial findings indicate Yttria is a regolith-hosted deposit with the bulk of rare earths associated with secondary oxide minerals that are easy to process.

Junior explorer Godolphin Resources has launched a four-hole diamond drilling program to follow up on high grade mineralisation struck by a previous explorer at its rare earths project near Temora in central-west NSW. The campaign will also focus on delivering core samples for mineralogical analysis, flow-path testing and metallurgical test work.

ASX-listed mining software firm K2fly has tabled record growth in key metrics for the June quarter and the 2022 financial year after continuing its hot streak of contract wins. The company posted record results in annual recurring revenue, invoices raised and cash receipts in addition to closing out the financial year with a cashflow-positive quarter of $1.7 million.

Estrella Resources has extended its T5 deposit by 300m south after step-out diamond drilling hit semi-massive nickel-copper sulphides. The explorer says its hole, part of the company’s Carr Boyd project in WA’s Goldfields region, intersects 1.8m of semi-massive to globular sulphides from 929m came within a broader 21.2m mineralised zone. Down-hole electromagnetic surveys are set to commence soon at the project.

Godolphin Resources has hit a broad intersection of anomalous copper at its Yeoval South prospect near Orange in NSW, just 350m south of the operation’s existing 12.8 million tonne mineral resource. The broad hit of 276m grading 0.12 per cent copper from 128m came from a two-hole, 900m program aiming to test the southern extensions of the mineral resource and homing in on copper at depth.

CZR Resources has moved swiftly to kick off drilling in order to establish a definitive feasibility study for its Robe Mesa iron ore project in WA’s Pilbara region after receiving heritage approval last month. The company is targeting the northern extension of Rio Tinto’s neighbouring Mesa F deposit as it aims to grow its iron ore inventory and increase production rate up to three million tonnes per annum from 2mtpa as outlined in CZR’s pre-feasibility study.

Perth-based American West Metals has kicked off a maiden drilling program at its Storm project on Somerset Island in Nunavut, Canada, where a number of high-grade copper targets will be tested. The campaign follows up on a raft of solid historical hits including 110m at 2.45 per cent copper from surface and 56.3m grading 3.07 per cent copper from 12.2m.