Public Company News

A second round of testwork on Surefire Resources’ breakthrough pre-treatment metallurgy has lifted the direct vanadium recovery from its Victory Bore magnetite resource in Western Australia to 97 per cent. The company says its proprietary method alleviates the vanadium industry’s standard needs for high-pressure treatment or high-temperature roasting of pre-treated magnetite and brings significant capex and opex advantages.

Xanadu Mines boss Colin Moorhead says funding security from the company’s union with Chinese giant Zijin Mining fosters a strong investment case for production at its Kharmagtai copper-gold project in Mongolia. Just last month, the company tabled a staggering resource estimate upgrade for Kharmagtai, jumping to 1.3 billion tonnes with 3.4 million tonnes of contained copper and 8.5 million gold ounces.

BMG Resources is planning to beef up its holdings in WA’s West Arunta region – known as elephant country for niobium and rare earths – with an option to nab a 90 per cent interest in 1470sq km of ground. The package sits 30km from Encounter Resources’ Crean project and its resource of 282 million tonnes at 0.54 per cent niobium oxide and 0.17 per cent TRE0.

Askari Metals says a detailed trench sampling campaign at its Uis project in Namibia has revealed a more significant lithium-rich pegmatite system than interpreted during initial mapping, with an average thickness of about 10m. The main pegmatite body has been mapped along a strike of about 2km and includes a south-west zone with an average thickness of 21m along 350m of strike.

Perth-based explorer King River Resources is on the hunt for high-grade gold in elephant country in Australia’s Top End. It has plenty of cash and a gaggle of lucrative-looking targets begging to see a drill bit. With miners selling gold at record highs, King River’s focus on Tennant Creek in the NT, an area that has historically pumped out millions of gold ounces, is timely.

Aruma Resources is putting its shoulder to the wheel to expand the gold and rare earths footprint at its Salmon Gums project in Western Australia’s Eastern Goldfields region after completing a 63-hole air-core drilling program. The campaign included 39 holes targeting rare earths, with the other 24 drillholes following up previous drilling to assess gold-bearing lodes at the company’s Thistle gold discovery.

Testwork on ore from Infinity Lithium’s San José project in Spain has confirmed recoveries of more than 90 per cent, a result that will support a definitive feasibility study and pilot plant design. The company says the results exceed recoveries assumed in the project’s scoping study and confirm consistent production of battery-grade lithium hydroxide monohydrate from the 111-million-tonne orebody.

Joint venture (JV) partners Horizon Minerals and Dundas Minerals have hit high-grade gold from an initial drilling program at their Windanya gold project after the two companies recently completed an option agreement.

Altech Batteries is getting closer to producing its Cerenergy solid-state battery pack that uses ordinary table-variety salt following an upgrade which has transformed its previously small trial batteries up to a 60kWh capacity. The upgrade came after Altech established a strategic joint venture with Germany’s Fraunhofer IKTS, which had initially developed battery packs with 5kWh and 10kWh capacities for testing.

Venus Metals has kicked off its maiden reverse-circulation drill campaign at its Youanmi lithium project where lithium-bearing pegmatites were recently discovered at its highly-compelling Deep South lithium prospect. The Deep South lithium prospect sits 44km south of the Youanmi Gold Mine, which is about 450km north-east of Perth in Western Australia’s rugged Murchison region.

The complex mineralisation at Strickland Metals’ Marwari trend is unravelling to reveal a 2.6km-long corridor with similar gold enrichment style to that seen at Millrose – which the company sold for $61 million. The corridor contains six leads that have seen little drilling to date. The company is planning to get its drill bit in the ground in April.

Ora Banda Mining’s Sand King deposit near Kalgoorlie is firming as the preferred site for its second underground gold mine following significant high-grade results from its first-phase drill campaign. Assays from the first 17 holes sunk at the operation produced grades considered favourable for underground mining after drilling extended the mineralised system to 1km of strike and 300m below surface.