Public Company News

88 Energy has confirmed the presence of hydrocarbons in core samples at depths that showed good oil flows during drilling of the Merlin-1 well at its Peregrine project in Alaska. The company is targeting a gross mean prospective resource of 645 million barrels of oil from the well. Geochemical analysis to better understand the quality of oil and its migration pathways continues.

Indiana Resources is set to begin probing the depths of its Minos gold discovery in South Australia, with diamond drilling scheduled to kick off later this week. The company says earlier rounds of shallow reverse circulation drilling have set the stage for the upcoming program, which will delve into the roots of the gold-rich system that has already returned assays of over half an ounce per tonne.

ASX-listed Si6 Metals has defined a 2.5km-long geophysical anomaly coinciding with shallow historical drilled copper-silver mineralisation at its 60 per cent owned Dibete prospect in Botswana. The past drill hits included 38m at 1.72 per cent copper and 119.5 grams per tonne silver. Si6 Metals is looking to pin-point base and precious metal targets for drill-testing.

ASX-listed Troy Resources has edged closer to bringing its 288,000-ounce Smarts underground gold deposit into production at its 100 per cent-owned Karouni project in Guyana. The company has been granted approvals from the Guyana Geology & Mines Commission to enable it to advance work on Smarts as it finalises a series of technical reports on the proposed development.

Blackstone Minerals has successfully completed the spin-out of its non-core assets, birthing Codrus Minerals which was admitted to the Australian Securities Exchange this week. Codrus’ initial public offering was built on Blackstone’s suite of Australian and US gold projects, with the company receiving 35 million shares as part of the listing and leaving the Vietnam-focused nickel developer with a 46 per cent holding in the new entity.

Quantum Graphite has entered a transformational joint venture agreement with The Sunlands Company to manufacture thermal energy storage battery cells, or “TES”, utilising graphite sourced from its Uley 2 deposit on the Eyre Peninsula in South Australia. Sunlands will contribute processing technologies and flake specifications for the final product, with the 50-50 partnership aiming to break into the burgeoning renewable power generation market.

In just three short months Strickland Metals has established a dominant land position in one of the world’s premier gold belts. Its rapid-fire consolidation of WA’s east Yandal Belt has already delivered a project resource inventory of 600,000 ounces and put it in a position to mount the first systematic drilling assault on a 100km-long stretch of the prospective Celia shear zone.

Impact Minerals is zeroing in on the source of nickel-PGE mineralisation at its Little Broken Hill Gabbro discovery in western New South Wales, with diamond drilling returning a 100m-thick intercept containing up to 5 per cent iron sulphides. Intriguingly, the intercept has a 50m-wide zone of anomalous copper mineralisation that looks similar in nature to the mineralised halo surrounding the massive Voisey’s Bay deposit in Canada.

Ardiden has sealed a joint venture agreement in relation to its hard-rock lithium projects in Canada after new partner Great Northern Lithium gave the nod to acquiring an 80 per cent interest in the assets. Great Northern, which plans to change its name to Green Technology Metals, exercised its option to buy the stake for $8.7 million over the next 18 months.

Venus Metals Corporation and joint venture partner Rox Resources have grown resources at their Youanmi gold project near Mt Magnet in Western Australia’s Murchison district by a whopping 39 per cent. Nearly 1.7 million ounces have now been defined with 800,000 ounces near surface and a further 856,000 high-grade ounces at depth. Resource drilling continues with a feasibility study on the cards.

Latitude Consolidated continues to return encouraging gold hits from an RC drilling campaign near the former Andy Well underground mine at its Murchison gold project in WA. Best of the latest reported drill intersections came from the Margaret prospect, including 3m at 2.52 g/t gold from 136m containing 1m at 7 g/t and 9m at 1.14 g/t from 150m with 2m at 3.09 g/t.

ASX-listed junior explorer Surefire Resources has been buoyed by a recently completed scoping study on its Perenjori iron ore project in WA’s south-west Murchison district that points to a potentially economically viable mining and beneficiation operation producing high-grade magnetite concentrate. The company says the study shows a “clear pathway” to meeting its 30 per cent internal rate of return hurdle for a project development.