Matt Birney

Aspiring uranium developer, Deep Yellow, has mobilised its drilling fleet in Namibia to produce samples for ongoing test work. Deep Yellow’s drills will complete 90 holes through the Tumas resource area to collect over a tonne of samples for metallurgical testing and technical analysis as part of its ongoing PFS program.

ASX-listed 3D metal printing technology player, Aurora Labs, has taken a significant step towards protecting its groundbreaking Multi-Layer Concurrent Printing, or "MCP" 3D printing technology after being granted a patent in China.

King River Resources is continuing to refine the feasibility study over its immense Speewah Dome high purity alumina project in the Kimberley region of WA, with recent developments including the streamlining of the HPA circuit to develop a product for use in technological applications.

Classic Minerals continues to go for gold at Kat Gap in WA with sampling pointing to an extensive gold anomaly west of the company’s high-grade discovery. Classic has recently completed a detailed auger program west of the Kat Gap resource area, identifying an extensive blind gold target covering more than 900 metres of strike – results from shallow auger holes tip the scales at up to 2,130 ppb gold.

ASX-listed Vietnam base metals hopeful, Blackstone Minerals, has fired up the drill bit again at its next nickel sulphide prospect at the historic Ta Khoa nickel-copper-PGMs project, 160km west of Hanoi, as part of its aggressive exploration drive through a treasure chest of massive sulphide vein targets.

ASX-listed Hot Chili may be onto another significant discovery – at the Cortadera North target zone – which could even be a twin to its Cortadera copper-gold porphyry system. The potential for a new “look-alike” discovery about 2km north of Cortadera, which shows a geochemical footprint of 2km in length, comes just weeks ahead of the company’s plans to announce a maiden resource estimate for the Chilean project.

ASX-listed platinum group metals explorer, Podium Minerals, is aiming for an upgraded resource estimate next month for its Parks Reef PGM project in the Mid West region of WA following more encouraging results from rock chip sampling work. The company is targeting a near-surface resource of between 1.5 million ounces and 2.6Moz of PGMs.

Okapi Resources has nailed down a strategic position in the fertile Lake Johnston greenstone belt west of Norseman in southern WA. The company has entered into a farm-in agreement with dynamic market player, Lithium Australia to explore for gold and base metals across that company’s strategic tenement holdings in the same greenstone belt as the old Maggie Hayes and Emily Ann nickel mines.

Ardiden has sunk a golden hole in one with the maiden drill hole of its diamond drilling program at the Kasagiminnis project in Canada intersecting visible gold. The early hit bodes well for the current exploration program over the deposit and demonstrates that the company has a good handle on the controls of the gold mineralisation at depth. Drilling continues and is designed to significantly boost the current resource over the coming months.

Godolphin Resources has returned a couple of very encouraging gold hits from the first hole of a phase two RC drilling program at its Mount Aubrey gold project in the venerated copper-gold Lachlan Fold Belt province in NSW. Notable intersections from that hole were 3m going 7.41 grams per tonne gold from 99m including 1m at 21 g/t, and 7m at 1.52 g/t from 36m.

After successfully identifying and drilling a number of extraordinary, multi-commodity mineral deposits in Bosnia, Adriatic Metals has moved to lock up the wider mineral province around its key project areas. The company has now more than quadrupled the size of its ground holdings in the region and locked up most of the 25km long metal rich terrane.

Barton Gold has added to its management credentials with the key appointment of an experienced corporate executive as the Gawler Craton gold hopeful gears up for a possible IPO next year. Shannon Coates joins the Perth-based gold junior as Company Secretary with more than 25 years of experience under her belt in corporate law and compliance services to publicly listed companies across multiple jurisdictions.

Blackstone Minerals has continued its successful delineation of the Ban Chang sulphide discovery with ongoing drilling intersecting broad zones of nickel mineralisation. The company’s maiden drilling program across the prospect has outlined nickel mineralisation over more than 1.2km of strike with latest results including 9.60m at 0.84 per cent nickel and 14.65m at 0.74 per cent nickel.

Wiluna Mining continues full steam ahead in the expansion of its namesake operation in WA with the world-class gold deposit continuing to produce outstanding results from underground development drilling which has returned 5.96m at 112.98 g/t gold including 0.65m at an incredible 880 g/t gold. The company is poised to deliver more good news in coming weeks with an updated resource set to be tabled before the end of the month.

ASX-listed gold hopeful, Coziron Resources, has followed up a high-grade discovery drill hole at the Top Camp prospect at its Croydon project with an encouraging gold hit in what is fast becoming one of WA’s hottest gold exploration districts. The Perth-based gold explorer’s Top Camp discovery sits about 75km west-south-west of the distending Hemi gold deposit discovered by De Grey Mining in the Mallina region in the Pilbara.

ASX-listed gold explorer, Great Southern Mining, has taken a giant stride towards developing its historic Cox’s Find gold project about 65km north of Laverton in WA, appointing seasoned mining industry geologist and executive Sean Gregory as its new Chief Executive Officer.

PharmAust subsidiary Epichem has entered into a joint venture deal to develop a “disruptive” waste-to-fuels technology using biomass and feedstock. Under the 50:50 agreement, medicinal and synthetic chemistry group Epichem and new JV partner Obsidian Minerals will set up the Perren company with the aim of developing and commercialising the biomass/feedstock oxidative hydrothermal dissolution chemical process that can turn waste into fuels.

Adriatic Metals continues to rattle the cage in the Balkans, posting a 32 per cent increase in the tonnage of its emerging world-class Rupice silver deposit in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The resource for Rupice weighs in at an impressive 12 million tonnes with 149 g/t silver, 1.4 g/t gold, 4.1 per cent zinc, 2.6 per cent lead, 0.5 per cent copper and 25 per cent barite.

Ardiden has launched into drilling at the Kasagiminnis gold deposit in Canada. The company has dispatched internationally renowned contractor Major Drilling to the site with the rods now spinning under the watchful eye of Ardiden’s exploration manager, Dan Grabiec. The company is set to drill into the Canadian winter as it goes about drilling out a new resource for the deposit.

Venus Metals and Rox Resources have struck high-grade gold again in granite rock at the exciting Grace discovery at their historic joint-ventured Youanmi project in WA. The latest bonanza gold hits add to mounting evidence that a style of gold mineralisation not recognised at Youanmi previously has been discovered by the dynamic duo. The spectacular drill intercepts included 13m at 60.49 g/t gold from 177m including 4m at a cracking 191.56 g/t.

Eclipse Metals is off and racing at the Mary Valley manganese project in Queensland as it gears up for diamond drilling later in the month. The company’s geophysical survey team on the ground in the area of the historical mine has commenced a detailed ground magnetic survey across the Amamoor workings in the south of its tenure.

Heavy rare earth explorer and developer Northern Minerals is gearing up to hunt for Dazzler lookalikes having set aside $5 million for exploration and development drilling at the company’s Browns Range project in the Kimberley. Drill rigs are expected onsite in October and results will feed into an updated feasibility study. The resulting document could well be the precursor to Northern Minerals emerging as the first supplier of heavy rare earths outside China.

Lithium Australia could be near to closing another loop in the battery economy, producing a slow release micronutrient fertiliser from recycling alkaline batteries. The fertiliser is tailor-made for broad-acre farming in WA and early indications suggest the crops have responded well to the treatment.

ASX-listed Lithium Australia has just received formal accreditation for its three-phase lithium battery-based solar energy storage devices from the Clean Energy Council. The devices will be marketed by Soluna Australia, which is 50 per cent owned by Lithium Australia and 50 per cent owned by manufacturer DLG Energy (Shanghai) Co. Soluna’s three-phase 15K Pack HV will now be added to the CEC’s Battery Assurance Program guide.

ASX-listed gold explorer, Anglo Australian Resources, has bought out a couple of legacy third-party royalties that had been hanging over its historic Mandilla gold project 20km south-east of Kambalda in WA. The Perth-based company has now cleared the decks for a potential mine development as it advances towards a maiden resource estimate for Mandilla in the December quarter.

Element 25 continues to pick off mine development milestones as the company fast-tracks its way towards first manganese concentrate production at its incredibly low proposed CAPEX Butcherbird operation in the Pilbara. The company has set itself a rapid project development schedule, which it says is tracking on time and on budget, with first manganese concentrate production expected in the first quarter of calendar 2021.

Legend Mining looks to be zeroing in on the ‘sweet spot’ at the Mawson nickel discovery in WA’s Fraser Range. Downhole electromagnetics has lit up a strong conductor adjacent to existing drilling and mineralisation with the target interpreted to potentially represent the elusive undiscovered primary nickel sulphide lode which ongoing drilling is hoping to reveal.

St George Mining’s deep drilling program at Mt Alexander in WA has fattened up its Investigators target with the latest intersection in drill hole MAD181 hitting 48.7m of the nickel-copper sulphide-bearing mafic-ultramafic host rock unit below 503m downhole. The hole also hit a second 6m interval of mineralised ultramafics from 282.6m downhole.

Eclipse Metals has launched into its maiden exploration program at the smoking hot Devil’s Elbow uranium prospect in the Northern Territory. First pass exploration included the field checking of key targets with radioactivity levels all but confirming the presence of the lucrative but controversial energy metal. The company has now begun planning for a first pass drilling program for the 2021 dry season.

Comet Resources has spiced up its portfolio with the acquisition of the high-grade Santa Teresa gold project in Mexico. Drilling at Santa Teresa has already returned a bevy of eye-catching gold hits including 3.9m at 39 g/t gold and 1m at a whopping 958.4 g/t gold. The company is updating the resource over the project with exploration expected to kick-off in the coming months.

Middle Island Resources looks to have a new near-surface gold resource in the making at its historic Sandstone gold project in WA following more high-grade drill hits from the Plum Pudding satellite deposit. Notable latest RC drill intersections included 7m at 24.1 g/t gold from 36m, 7m at 19.0 g/t from 36m, 12m at 7.22 g/t from 40m, 3m at 24.7 g/t from surface and 3m at 10.0 g/t from 30m.

Lithium Australia is set to claim ‘first mover’ status after Envirostream signed two additional suppliers to provide spent EV battery packs for recycling through the company’s innovative facility in Melbourne. These new contracts complete the company’s supply chain with Envirostream claiming ‘first mover’ status in Australia and set to expand the business through the Asia-Pacific region.