Matt Birney

Kingwest Resources’ drilling campaign at Menzies in WA has continued to return a stream of spectacular drill intercepts including 1m at 107.00 g/t gold from 88m and an impressive 5m at 13.8 g/t gold that boasts a 2m long higher-grade section going an ounce to the tonne gold from 122m. The company has now expanded its program over the resurgent goldfield from 10,000m to 14,000m of drilling.

Altech Chemicals has agreed to sell a 25 per cent stake in its German subsidiary, Altech Industries Germany, for €5 million – or about A$8.3 million. Frankfurt Stock Exchange-listed Altech Advanced Materials will buy the AIG stake, delivering the ASX-listed parent company a useful cash harvest that will help advance its Malaysian high purity alumina play.

ASX-listed gold and base metals hopeful, White Cliff Minerals, has uncovered a handful of significant, near-surface drill intersections from a small RC program undertaken a decade ago at its historic Reedy South gold project 40km north of Cue in WA’s rejuvenated Murchison goldfields. One of the more notable assays was an eye-catching 20m going 4.13 grams per tonne gold from 2m including 3m at 11.33 g/t from 5m.

Image Resources' “MORE” program continues to pay dividends for the WA mineral sands producer with drilling at the Boonanarring Northern Extension Area pointing to high-grade mineralisation over more than 2,700m of strike. The drilling program has produced a raft of high-grade intercepts including 5m at an impressive 44.5 per cent heavy mineral sands from only 30m below surface.

Middle Island Resources has pulled out all stops to get its Sandstone gold project feasibility study on the street by early in the new year. The company has cleared its backlog of samples in the assay lab, paving the way for the completion of the resource estimates over its recent gold discoveries and open pit optimisation work with the goal being first gold by 2021.

TNT Mines has exploded onto the gold scene in Western Australia acquiring privateer Warriedar Mining along with its two strategic goldfields projects and its well-credentialed chairman, Alex Hewlett. Hewlett shot to fame on the back of his recent success with Spectrum Metals.

ASX-listed equatorial Africa lithium hopeful, AVZ Minerals, has finally made solid headway in its efforts to set up a Special Economic Zone agreement inside the Democratic Republic of the Congo. If ratified, the agreement would enshrine significant tax concessions to the company in relation to its 75 per cent owned Manono lithium and tin project in the DRC.

Lindian Resources has signed an agreement to acquire the Woula bauxite project in Guinea, scooping up a 75 per cent holding in the near-term production asset. The project sits just 10km from an established mine haul road linking it to a nearby export port facility at Katougouma. The high-grade resources at Woula could potentially be mined for direct shipping ore, rapidly transforming Lindian from an emergent developer into a bauxite producer.

ASX-listed aspiring gold producer, Calidus Resources, remains on track for the main construction phase of its new $120 million Warrawoona mine development in WA’s East Pilbara to kick off in the first quarter next year with steady progress being made in the project’s early capital works program. The company says it has also ordered long lead items including a SAG mill.

ASX-listed gold and base metals explorer, Comet Resources, has reached a breakthrough agreement that frees it up to proceed with exploration at the historic Barraba copper project along the Peel Fault line in the New England Fold Belt region, NSW.

ASX-listed agribusiness developer, Alterra Ltd, has reached a significant milestone at its planned 300-hectare Carpenters avocado development in Pemberton, WA, with the company planting the first batch of avocado trees across an initial five hectares of land.

Emu NL has wasted no time and hit the ground running across its recently acquired suite of gold and nickel projects in southern WA. The company has put its exploration team in play at the 8 Mile project near the Menzies gold mining centre north of Kalgoorlie, while it makes preparations to commence extensional drilling at the high-grade Gnow’s Nest gold deposit south of Yalgoo.

Entering the final stretch ahead of its much-anticipated ASX listing, Barton Gold is shaping up as a serious player on Australia’s gold exploration scene. The company has lifted the lid on a 73 per cent resource upgrade at Tunkillia and seems destined to join the million-ounce club, unveiling a massive 965,000-ounce resource at the project.

ASX-listed explorer, Impact Minerals, has discovered zones of visual copper-nickel sulphides at the Plat Central prospect within its Broken Hill project in NSW. The company was again guided by its proprietary geochemical ratio exploration tool that it says can vector in on higher-grade base and platinum group metals mineralisation.

St George Mining has come up trumps again at Mt Alexander in WA with two fresh downhole EM conductors turning up in the latest diamond drill hole at its aptly named West End prospect. Less than 1km north-west of known massive sulphides, the prospect presents a tantalising target for the John Prineas-led explorer in an area where there has been no previous drilling.

PolarX has laid out a schedule for when the company expects to be receiving further copper and gold results from its Alaskan discovery at Zackly. It would appear that on top of the challenges posed by exploration in the wilds of the arctic, the current surge in exploration activity across the globe has caught many laboratories by surprise, with delays in reporting being experienced by most mining and exploration companies.

CZR Resources is marching towards completion of a pre-feasibility study on a proposed development of the Robe Mesa iron ore deposit at its 85 per cent-owned Yarraloola project in WA’s Pilbara. The study that is set to be wound up by year’s end will assess a low-CAPEX iron ore mine predicated on using existing road transport infrastructure to truck the Robe Mesa ore to port.

Caeneus Minerals has nailed down a bevy of drill targets across its Mallina tenure in WA’s gold-rich Pilbara region.

Middle Island Resources has increased the global gold resource based on multiple satellite deposits at its historic Sandstone gold project in WA as its massive drilling effort this year continues to pay dividends. A maiden resource estimate for the McIntyre deposit and updated estimates for the Twin Shafts and Goat Farm deposits pushed up the project’s overall contained gold figure by 40,100 ounces to above 732,100 ounces.

Legend Mining continues to light up new nickel sulphide targets at the Mawson nickel discovery in WA’s Fraser Range, with down-hole electromagnetics identifying two new off-hole conductors adjacent to recent drilling. The larger of these two targets appears to extend the Mawson west prospect to the north and demonstrates the nickel mineralisation at the discovery remains unconstrained by the current drill pattern.

Wiluna Mining Corporation is ramping up production and pushing its unit operating costs down at the Wiluna Gold project. The company poured 13,360 ounces of gold during the September quarter, delivering monthly operating cash flows of around $4m. The production figures represent an 18 per cent uplift on the June quarter gold production and a welcome upwards trajectory for the once troubled project.

ASX-listed 3D metal printing developer, Aurora Labs, has successfully completed the first phase print parameter testing of its RMP-1 printer with plans on track to have commercial applications in place by mid next year. Aurora said its latest high power, high density printing results will enable its Rapid Manufacturing Technology to outperform its competitor’s laser bed fusion printers.

Eclipse Metals has discovered previously unknown near-surface high-grade manganese mineralisation at its Amamoor manganese prospect in Queensland. Assay results from the company’s diamond drill samples included some stellar grades as high at 42.14 per cent manganese oxide with every drill hole of this year’s program having hit mineralisation.

Classic Minerals has peeled off a string of high-grade gold hits from a major infill RC drilling campaign at its advanced Kat Gap project about 170km south of Southern Cross in WA. Better results were 15m at 2.97 g/t gold including 1m at 23.20 g/t, 10m at 3.24 g/t including 1m at 18.40 g/t, 4m at 8.97 g/t including 1m at 23.40 g/t, and 2m at 16.57 g/t including 1m at 30.30 g/t.

Godolphin Resources says it has discovered a new copper-gold porphyry-style mineralised system at its Copper Hill East project 35km north of Orange, NSW, in the revered Lachlan Fold Belt following an initial round of deep RC drilling. The most notable intercept from the recent RC holes was 32m at 0.29 g/t gold and 0.13 per cent copper from 210m including 12m going 0.45 g/t gold and 0.22 per cent copper.

Venus Metals Corporation has jumped back into drilling at Youanmi, wasting no time following up on a swag of emerging prospects surrounding the mothballed historic gold operation. The company has kicked off reverse circulation drilling across the Youanmi North, Taylors Reef and Sovereign prospects as it zeroes in on a new batch of discoveries across this fertile gold terrane.

Novo Resources is full steam ahead as it hurtles towards gold production in WA’s Pilbara region, with the company’s latest update highlighting rapid progress in the refurbishment of its Golden Eagle mill and development across the emerging Beaton Creek mining area.

Oakdale Resources’ drilling looks to be on target at Lambarson Canyon in the US, with the company having now finished its first diamond drill hole down to nearly 250m below surface. Geological logging indicates that the target stratigraphy has been tested, intersecting a range of potentially auriferous lithologies including quartz breccia’s, multiple porphyry dykes, and quartz-sulphide veining at depth.

ASX-listed medical technology company, Proteomics International Laboratories, has entered into an agreement with Medical Horizons that will see the Italy-based group distribute the easy-to-use immunoassay version of Proteomics’ PromarkerD predictive test for diabetic kidney disease in Italy.

Adriatic Metals has produced a cracking pre-feasibility study on its Vares silver-lead-zinc project in Bosnia and Herzegovina that envisages US$251 million average EBITDA per annum in the first five years of production operations. In addition, the PFS has placed a spectacular after-tax net present value of US$1.04 billion and an internal rate of return of 113 per cent on the project.

Dampier Gold has uncovered a new zone of high-grade gold mineralisation at its Browns Dam prospect, west of Kalgoorlie in WA. Wide-spaced aircore drilling, targeting the auriferous Zuleika Shear has intercepted near surface gold mineralisation in a series of shallow aircore holes, with better results including 5m at 3.1 g/t gold from only 38m down-hole.

Blackstone Minerals has unveiled its much-anticipated scoping study for the Ta Khoa nickel project in Vietnam, delivering a tantalising set of numbers headlined by a AU$1 billion present-day valuation and net pre-tax cash flows in excess of US$1.2 billion over the projected 8.5-year life of mine. The financials clearly support the case for a revival of its mothballed nickel operation in Vietnam.