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 received a five-year drilling approval following an environmental impact assessment submission for exploration and having reached agreement with local landholders.
Valor has been eager to get into the porphyry copper project ever since rock chip samples returned up to 7.4 per cent copper and channel samples gave 13.1m at 1.38 per cent copper and 24m grading 1.08 per cent. Detailed drill planning and program logistics are set to commence shortly.
The maiden 5,000m drilling program at Picha will test four targets within the approved area.
Valor Executive Chairman, George Bauk, said: “Valor has developed an incredible pipeline of large-scale, high impact porphyry and epithermal targets across the Picha Project tenements. With up to 120 holes approved, the start of this program will signal the beginning of a transformational period for all of our key stakeholders.”
The company’s Picha project is located in southern Peru approximately 17km north easterly from Buenaventura’s San Gabriel gold-copper-silver project which has resources of 132.7 million tonnes grading 1.8 g/t gold equivalent for 7.6 million ounces of gold equivalent.
Exploration work completed by Valor in 2021 included geochemical sampling, geological mapping, induced polarisation and resistivity geophysical surveys. The work identified the project’s Cobremani, Maricate, Cumbre Coya and Fundicion targets as the highest priority.
The Picha project comprises 20 granted mining concessions covering 165 square kilometres with a further 65sq km of ground still in the application stage.
Peru is the second largest copper producer in the world after neighbouring Chile. The bulk of its copper production is from porphyry copper deposits that are known for their size such as the Escondida Mine in Chile which produced more than one million tonnes of copper in 2021 and will operate until at least 2078.
Based upon 2021 production figures in Peru, porphyry copper deposits give rise to the world’s fifth, sixth and eighth largest copper producers at Antamina, Cerro Verde and Las Bambas respectively. Antamina produced 426,700 tonnes of copper in 2021 closely followed by Cerro Verde which produced 402,300 tonnes.
With Valor drilling four porphyry copper targets which have returned previous high-grade surface samples and geophysical anomalies its potential appears high. Given the scale of the targets and comparable Andean porphyry copper mines the drilling program has the chance to propel Valor to another level. Time now to see if the sausage matches the sizzle.
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By Matt Birney
