Public Company News

Globe Metals & Mining has ticked off a 10-tonne sample from its Kanyika niobium project as part of a plant feasibility study in Malawi. Management says it will be used to design a pilot plant, a testwork program and for commercial grade offtake samples. Globe recently became the first to sign a Mining Development Agreement with the Malawian Government for the advancement of its project.

Meeka Metals has bumped its total Murchison gold project resource up to 12.7 million tonnes at 3g/t for 1.215 million ounces of gold after revealing an initial oxide gold resource from its St Anne’s deposit. The St Anne’s resource of 270,000 tonnes at 2.8g/t gold for 25,000 ounces will be included in the company’s Murchison prefeasibility study to be released in June.

Aruma Resources has produced lithium concentrate from early metallurgical testwork at its Mt Deans project, 10km from Norseman in WA. Floatation has recovered 80 per cent of the lithium into 25 per cent of the mass with capture of tantalum, tin, potassium, rubidium and caesium giving the prospect of valuable additional by-products. Further testwork is to be undertaken with fresh outcropping pegmatite samples.

Infinity Mining is gearing up for its first East Pilbara drill campaign for 2023 after receiving cultural heritage clearance from the Nyamal Aboriginal Corporation to explore its Hillside nickel-copper project. The company has appointed iDrilling Australia to kick off a nine-hole RC program to test surface geochemistry and anomalies highlighted in a 2018 air-borne electromagnetic survey.

Venus Metals and IGO have inked a binding agreement for exploration – and possibly development and extraction – at the pair’s Henderson nickel-lithium project in WA’s Eastern Goldfields. The deal involves a farm-in and joint venture in which a subsidiary of IGO can progressively acquire up to a 70 per cent interest in the project by spending $4 million on exploration and reimbursing Venus with $1 million.

WA explorer Terrain Minerals has extended an induced polarisation survey at its Smokebush project in the State’s Mid West region after its initial scrutiny picked up a third hidden target that has more than whetted its interest. Key permits have already been granted, with drill rig quotes also received, and Terrain hopes to get the drill bit spinning by the end of next month.

Horizon Minerals is targeting extensions to its known resource of 270,000 tonnes at 4.99g/t gold in a new drilling campaign at its high-grade Penny’s Find gold deposit, 50km north-east of Kalgoorlie. The company will drill 2400m of RC with diamond core tails. Penny’s Find gold production will follow Horizon’s Cannon gold mine, which will start production in the second half of this year.

Surefire Resources has commissioned METS Engineering to undertake vital metallurgical testwork at its Victory Bore project in Western Australia’s Mid West region to help further its bid to impact Australasia’s emerging vanadium battery sector. Management hopes the move will boost the project’s value by finding a streamlined separation process to extract vanadium from its magnetite hosts.

Galan Lithium has labelled its beefed-up resource “world class”, with 6.6 million tonnes of lithium carbonate equivalent at 880 milligrams per litre lithium at its Hombre Muerto West project in Argentina. Management says it is the third significant resource upgrade in three years and 72 per cent of the new figure sits in the higher “measured” category, representing 4.7 million tonnes grading 873 mg/l lithium.

American West Metals has revealed immediate RC drill program success at its Storm copper project in Canada’s far north … with the promise of more to come. The North American-focused company says the first four holes completed at its 4100N prospect all intersected thick visual copper sulphide intervals, confirmed to contain copper based on portable XRF analysis.

Everest Metals believes the identification of a raft new pegmatites has significantly boosted the potential of its Mt Edon mining lease near Paynes Find. Deep Ground Penetration Radar survey over 21 line kilometres shows 133 pegmatite-like anomalies prospective for lithium-tantalum and rare earths mineralisation that extends to depths greater than 50m. The discovery has sparked a new drilling program, to start within a fortnight.

Australian oil and gas company Empire Energy Group has turned the tap back on at its Carpentaria-2H gas well in the Northern Territory’s world-renowned Beetaloo sub-basin as it sets its sites on a pilot production plant. The well clocked a March quarter production rate of 2.81 million standard cubic feet per day over a 30-day period, up 17 per cent from previous tests.