Podium Minerals is closing in on preferred locations to start mining at its Parks Reef platinum group gold project in WA’s Mid West after results from its stage-nine drilling program continued to deliver the potential for higher grades in its hunt for critical minerals.
Last month the company doubled the depth of its Parks Reef platinum group metals, or “PGM” orebody to more than 500m along a 15km strike length.
Podium has only received results from 11 of the 22 holes completed in the stage-nine activities. However, it has already had the drill bit spinning on a stage-10 RC program of 9400m since March.
Seven holes yielded intercepts of greater than 1.0 g/t, platinum, palladium and gold or ‘3E PGM’, with Podium saying several encountered standout results that support the possibility for higher-grade zones within the area of the defined mineral resource estimate or “MRE”.
Standout intercepts include 15m going 3.88g/t 3E PGM, comprising 2.59 g/t platinum, 1.26 g/t palladium and 0.03 g/t gold from 17m and a hole grading 27m reading 2.23 g/t 3E PGM, 1.15 g/t platinum, 0.99 g/t palladium and 0.09 g/t gold from 9m. The exploration not reporting significant intercepts was located outside of the known reef location.
The seven holes with meaningful results will also be tested for highly valuable rhodium and iridium, in addition to base metals copper and nickel.
Results are expected to be available in June.
The company is aiming to define an enlarged exploration target of 70 million tonnes to 75Mt at 1.2 grams per tonne to 1.6 g/t 3E PGM for 2.7 million ounces to 3.8Moz 3E PGM. An inferred MRE currently sits at 2.8Moz 3E PGM.
Podium noted it is seeing a geological package at the wholly-owned Parks Reef that shows high continuity of the PGM reef and high-grade zones from surface to the recently drilled 500m deep holes announced last month.
The company added the orebody is still open at depths below those deep penetrations.
The stage-nine results and the subsequent stage-10 drilling targeting significant PGM zones will help identify preferred mining locations from where to start developing the Parks Reef orebody.
Podium Minerals Managing Director and CEO Sam Rodda says it is a perfect time to be associated with PGM’s given their importance to Australia’s critical minerals strategy.
“Demand for PGM’s globally remains strong as the use of platinum and palladium in auto catalysts continues to play a key role in managing vehicle emissions in line with greenhouse gas emission targets globally.”
“Platinum is also shaping up as a key catalyst ingredient in PEM hydrogen fuel cells supporting the new clean hydrogen economy. Podium’s resource has a high Pt:Pd ratio above 1:1, this is a similar ratio of PGM’s to those seen in the majority of South African PGM operations.”
Rodda, promoted to the MD position and the Podium board in April along with well-known non-executive director Rod Baxter, noted the Mid West of WA is also the perfect setting with existing infrastructure, mining supply chains and low environmental risk to deliver the feed of critical PGM minerals to help steer the sector towards a cleaner future.
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By Matt Birney
