Announcements

Joint venture partners Venus Metals and Rox Resources have hit bonanza-grade results from an RC hole sunk into their Youanmi South prospect including a 3m intercept at almost five ounces per tonne gold from 218m. The outstanding 138.7 g/t gold hit was contained in a wider 28m segment grading more than an ounce per tonne at 34.81 g/t gold from 204m and includes an 18m section going 51.96 g/t from 207m and 10m at 79.55 g/t from 211m.

WA-based oil producer Triangle Energy has signed a binding farm-out agreement with Talon Energy for two onshore gas permits in the Perth Basin after all conditions of the deal were met. The transaction includes the first of two payments towards a 50 per cent share in the 3D seismic dataset known as “Bookara” which stretches across the two permits that were delivered in January. However, final interpretation, mapping and prospect evaluation of the data is ongoing.

ASX-listed Reach Resources is gearing up for an exploration blitz across its Gascoyne tenements following the immediate appointment of experienced geologist Steve Vallance as the company’s Exploration Manager. The explorer recently acquired the Morrissey Hill lithium project, the Camel Hill rare earths project and the White Castles manganese project located in and around existing exploration hotspots in the region.

Galan Lithium has delivered an average grade of 829 milligrams per litre lithium brine in results to a depth of 455m at its Santa Barbara exploration well in Argentina. The results which come from part of the company’s Hombre Muerto West project are at the highest end of lithium brine results achieved so far. Galan says it has the highest grade and lowest impurity lithium brine assets in Argentina and has commenced a fourth production well at its wholly owned project.

Valor Resources has been given Peruvian Government approval to drill up to 120 drill holes across multiple targets at its Picha copper project. The company has been eager to get the drill bit spinning ever since rock chip samples returned up to 7.4 per cent copper and channel samples delivered 13.1m at 1.38 per cent copper and 24m grading 1.08 per cent at the porphyry copper-silver project. Detailed program planning is due to commence shortly.

ASX-listed explorer 88 Energy has reached another milestone in a major Alaskan oil basin. The company has received formal approval over the formation of its Toolik River Unit which comprises leases within the western and central area of Project Phoenix. Grouping the leases together allows 88 Energy to push ahead with further exploration in the Alaska North Slope oil field and investigate pathways to development.

AVZ Minerals continues to record impressive assays from its Manono lithium and tin project in the Democratic Republic of Congo including a whopping 113m hit at 1.79 per cent lithium from 65.1m. The massive intercept was from one of four diamond drill holes sunk into the company’s Roche Dure north-east extension and also included 860 parts-per-million tin in addition to a higher grade zone with a 36m section going 2.06 per cent lithium and 887ppm tin from 141m.

Battery metals company Lithium Australia has boosted revenue by more than 40 per cent in the second half of calendar year 2022 compared to the corresponding period in 2021. The WA-based ASX-listed company, whose interests encompass several aspects of the so-called “green energy revolution”, also slashed its losses in that same period according to the company’s latest half-year accounts.

DiscovEx Resources is set to offload its Gooroo project in WA’s Murchison region after entering into an option agreement to sell off the prospective gold and copper tenure to fellow explorer Cooper Metals. The Perth-based explorer will continue to focus its exploration efforts on its portfolio of precious and base metal projects that are scattered across the state.

ASX-listed Infinity Mining continues to shore up its Pilbara operations after securing a five-year exploration licence extension for another of the key tenements that forms part of its Hillside project. The company is currently undertaking a detailed open-file review and geophysical interpretation over the site with reconnaissance mapping and surface sampling planned for this year’s field season.

Image Resources has upgraded its Bidaminna mineral sands project with a seven per cent resource increase to 109 million tonnes and a whopping 15 per cent increase in grade to 2.5 per cent total heavy minerals. Total contained heavy minerals also increased 23 per cent to 2.8 million tonnes. Bidimanna is part of the company’s existing profitable mineral sands operation approximately 120km north of Perth.

Perth-based industrial piping disruptor Polyline Pipe Systems believes its innovative method of producing “HDPE” poly pipes on site can help resources companies ease the current scourge of runaway prices bedevilling their sector. Polyline says its MPX630 mobile pipe extruder can reduce the conventional process to just three steps: on-site manufacture, a single weld at the end of a continuous pipe length and trench or surface installation as required.

ASX-listed Alaskan oil explorer 88 Energy is one step closer to tapping into the massive Alaska North Slope oil basin. As ice pad construction nears completion, the company remains on track for the Hickory-1 well to spud in early March, testing over the next month its six targets in the company’s Phoenix acreage that is estimated to hold 647 million barrels of oil.

Adriatic Metals is continuing to score goals at its Vares silver project, extending known mineralisation whilst pressing to identify more resources from its prospective tenements in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

ASX-listed Galan Lithium is set to spin the drill rods at its wholly-owned Greenbushes South project after approval for the company’s submitted Program of Works. The Greenbushes South Project tenement is located within spitting distance of the famed Greenbushes lithium mine and the initial campaign will see approximately 2,500 metres of drilling test the first of several key targets.

Minerals explorer Aurum Resources is about to kick off a ground induced polarisation, or “IP” geophysical survey at its flagship Penny South gold project in WA’s East Murchison in search of nickel and copper mineralisation. The IP gradient array survey over a 5.2 square kilometre block covers an historical anomalous nickel strike that returned 8m going 0.44 per cent nickel from 32m.

Kairos Minerals has extended mineralisation below its existing 1.1-million-ounce gold resource at the company’s Mount York project in WA’s Pilbara after landing hits including 10m at 4.9 g/t gold from 257m. Known mineralisation has now been stretched 85m below the existing planned open pit depths. The latest results offer potential for a resource upgrade and future underground mining in high-grade gold shoots within the 3km resource strike length.

A phase two and three investment agreement between Xanadu Mines and Zijin Mining Group for Xanadu’s Mongolian copper-gold projects has been given the go ahead after the deal received final approval from China. The partnership will fully fund the ASX-listed Xanadu’s flagship Kharmagtai copper-gold project through the next phase of evaluation and exploration as it builds towards a decision to mine.

Altech Chemicals has held a successful shareholders vote to approve a name change to Altech Batteries Limited to better reflect the company’s direction of “meeting a battery storage future”. The ASX ticker will remain ATC. Altech has three battery focused projects, Silumina lithium-ion battery anodes, Cerenergy- an alternative to grid storage batteries and a high-purity alumina project.

Infinity Mining has been granted a five-year exploration licence extension for one of the key tenements at its Panorama project in the Pilbara where the company is targeting its Brisbane nickel prospect. Last year the explorer collected a total of 35 samples at the site with assays showing results of up to 7636 parts-per-million nickel and 8918ppm chromium consistent with previous geochemical results.

Kalgoorlie Gold Mining has identified gold and lithium anomalies in a first-pass 315 auger hole program at its wholly owned Pianto project 85km north of Kalgoorlie. The company says its campaign was targeting gold in granite and lithium pegmatites. The fresh gold anomalisms are along the southern margin of a fault-related northwest striking demagnetised zone. Outcropping pegmatites were also found at two locations near lithium anomalies in addition to minerals tentatively identified as spodumene.

Quantum Graphite has secured a further five years tenure over its flagship Uley 2 project on the Eyre Peninsula in South Australia. Uley 2 boasts an impressive 6.3 million tonne resource going 11.1 per cent total graphitic carbon for 697,000 tonnes of graphite. The company is also making strides towards financing the project after meeting key objectives to issue corporate bonds on the Luxembourg Stock Exchange.

Venus Metals has its drill bit spinning again, this time at its historical Bellchambers gold deposit, part of the company’s Sandstone project in the WA Goldfields. The campaign follows up a 2020 exploration program that delivered a substantial increase in Bellchambers’ JORC-compliant indicated mineral resource. The new work will target structurally controlled gold mineralisation and will test the depth continuation of mineralisation.

Mining software provider K2fly has reported revenue of $5.4m for the second half of 2022 – a 19 per cent rise on the company’s revenue for the same period in 2021. The company has products at work in 62 countries and regards its revenue growth as testament to the success of its strategy of focusing on Tier 1 and 2 global mining companies.

The JV between Everest Metals and Stelar Metals has wasted no time in declaring the duo’s Trident Project has potential to host economic quantities of Greenbushes-style lithium. Field work is set to start with drilling planned for mid-2023 at the NSW project covering over 750 square kilometres of tenements. The joint venture is researching geophysical techniques to identify those that can potentially map the size, shape and location of pegmatites at depth to optimise potential lithium drill targets.

St George Mining has kicked off a 20,000m drilling campaign at its Mount Alexander lithium project 200km north of Kalgoorlie. The target is a 15km lithium pegmatite belt with the company seeking to replicate Red Dirt Metal’s nearby Mount Ida lithium resource of 12.7 million tonnes grading 1.2 per cent lithium. Results from St George’s 2022 program include 14m at 0.32 per cent lithium from 69m and 1m at 1.8 per cent lithium from 70m.

Toro Energy has recommenced drilling at its Dusty nickel project after recording its thickest massive nickel sulphide intersection so far at the company’s Dimma prospect in the Yandal greenstone belt in WA. The diamond drilling program was restarted after the company completed three holes at the prospect last week that revealed a 4.5m intercept of continuous massive nickel sulphide from 194.3m downhole.

Joint venture partners Venus Metals and Rox Resources are continuing to be impressed by their Midway discovery at the duo’s Youanmi gold project with the most recent assays from the current drill campaign reporting new thick high-grade gold intercepts. Headline figures include 6.76m at 15.4 grams per tonne gold from 169.1m and 3.73m at 10.25 g/t gold from 405.8m.

Meeka Metals has confirmed the presence of high-grade gold at its Circle Valley project near Esperance after assays from a diamond drilling campaign produced impressive results and hit gold in every hole. Late last year the company completed a five-hole diamond drilling program aiming to gather data and test a 1200m by 400m gold anomaly that was detected during a previous RC campaign.

RC drilling at PolarX’s based gold-silver project in Nevada, USA has defined structural targets for high-grade gold within a bulk tonnage hydrothermal mineralised system environment. Exploration revealed extensive gold mineralisation associated with weak sulphides at the company’s Star Canyon prospect. Surrounded by large gold-silver heap leach mines the explorer is pursuing bulk tonnage heap leach gold-silver targets.

Venus Metals Corporation’s partner in the East Greenbushes project, IGO Limited, has launched an exploration blitz on its site that sits adjacent to the world-renowned Greenbushes lithium mine. IGO is planning a geochemical survey specifically targeting lithium at the site and expects to take a total of 1350 soil samples at the operation in the South West region of WA.

Near-term nickel producer Estrella is one step closer to delivering its much-needed battery metal to the market. Glencore’s Murrin Murrin operation has received a bulk sample of high-grade nickel from the company’s Spargoville 5A project, 20 kilometres south-west of Kambalda. Estrella says its assays have met all the specifications from Glencore and the processing of the sample has begun.