Andrew Duffy

Galan Lithium has set a new record at its Hombre Muerto West project in Argentina’s world-renowned “Lithium Triangle”, pumping 981 milligrams per litre of lithium brine at 15 litres per second during testing. At the company’s Catalina tenement, the first diamond hole hit 300m of highly-fractured rock flowing at 6 litres per second following airlift, with fluid density of about 1216 grams per cubic centimetre.

Australian rockers Cold Chisel made Bow River famous way back in 1982 with their song of the same name. Now Lycaon Resources wants to do the same by unearthing a nickel-copper monster at its Bow River project in Western Australia’s Kimberley region. The project is the flagship operation for a discovery-focused company more than willing to get its hands – and drills – dirty.

Buru Energy will assume full ownership of the 500-barrel per day Ungani oilfield in Western Australia’s Canning Basin from next month after JV partner Roc Oil decided to withdraw from its 50 per cent interest. Roc Oil will remain liable for its share of costs associated with both the near-term staged suspension of Ungani operations and the future decommissioning of all wells and remediation costs.

Classic Minerals will begin trial mining at its Kat Gap project in Western Australia’s goldfields as it looks to calculate an ore reserve prior to moving into full-scale gold mining and production. The company says the pit will take about two months to complete, cost about $1.5 million and will target fully-oxidized high-grade ore, representing about half the indicated resource, to about 45m.

Newly-appointed Lithium Australia managing director Simon Linge has vowed to fast-track the company’s development as the Perth-based battery innovator moves to commercialise its patented technologies. Mr Linge has more than 25 years of global manufacturing, recycling and engineering services experience and as the company’s chief executive officer, contributed to the landmark development agreement signed earlier this month with mining heavyweight Mineral Resources.

Phase-one construction of Galan Lithium’s first 205,000-square-metre solar evaporation pond has kicked-off at the company’s Hombre Muerto West project in Argentina’s renowned “Lithium Triangle”. Management expects the pond to be complete and filled with brine by next year’s first quarter and then to be producing a 6 per cent lithium chloride concentrate by the first half of 2025.

Perth-based explorer Si6 Metals has promoted its executive director Jim Malone to managing director as the company matures rare earths and lithium projects in Brazil, in addition to other operations in Botswana and Australia. It comes after it moved to acquire about 178 square kilometres of tier-one Brazilian rare earths and lithium ground in the Jequitinhonha Valley – which is fast becoming known as “Lithium Valley”.

Buru Energy says a surprise State Government policy update has fortified its development strategy for its 100 per cent-owned Rafael gas field in WA’s onshore Canning Basin, confirming its right to export gas. The updated “Domestic Gas Policy” confirms that fields such as Rafael, which are not connected to existing pipelines, must reserve only 15 per cent of their export volumes for the domestic market.

ABx Group has started a new 18-hole campaign to see if it can expand on a recent 11m-thick hit at 1700ppm total rare earth oxides at its promising Deep Leads prospect in Northern Tasmania. It says the RC program will target the northern section of its exploration area near the recent rare earths hit in a bid to find similar thickness and enrichments.

Surefire Resources has sealed a pivotal memorandum of understanding with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, where it will now process ore from its Victory Bore vanadium and high-purity alumina project in WA.

Buru Energy is $5 million richer after selling the remaining share of its Carnarvon Basin acreage to Energy Resources and will now move towards developing its Rafael gas-condensate field in the Canning Basin. The company plans to develop its field with a two-phased approach and will supply gas to the Kimberley, in addition to blue-methane and ammonia.

On the back of a strong scoping study last year, Perth-based company Toro Energy has commissioned a pilot processing plant design and added vanadium to its Wiluna uranium project in Western Australia’s Goldfields region. The study into a standalone operation at its Lake Maitland deposit holds a pre-tax net present value of $610 million and a total capital cost of $270 million.

From the sometimes dark and dingy bedroom corners that play home to online gaming, to the searingly bright lights of one of the world’s hottest commodities, Lithium Universe has orchestrated a remarkable ASX transformation. Lithium Universe confirmed last Friday it had raised its maximum subscription of $4.5 million at a share price of 2 cents each, announcing itself a new lithium industry player.

Reach Resources’ imminent maiden drill campaign at its Bonzer pegmatite field in Western Australia’s Gascoyne region now has new intrigue attached after the company unveiled soil samples going as high as 759ppm lithium oxide. Assays came in at an average of 128ppm lithium oxide, suggesting a strong, coherent lithium anomaly extending more than 1.5km along strike and 700m in width and remaining open.

Brightstar Resources has struck more gold at its Menzies project in WA’s glittering goldfields, where 18 of 19 holes hit grades of more than 2g/t at its Aspacia prospect and all holes within its “Link Zone” found pay. The company says gold mineralisation is now confirmed in more than 500m of strike at Aspacia, while the Link Zone area has potential for open-pit mining.

Empire Energy Group has revealed a new deal with infrastructure specialists APA Group to progress gas transport solutions for its Carpentaria gas project in the Northern Territory. The company says it is now planning two stages of development for the project, which has the potential to service the Top End and east coast of Australia with more than 500 terajoules of power per day.

Empire Energy is predicting an increase in gas flow from its Carpentaria-3H well following a five-month post-fracture stimulation shut-in and soak at its permit within the Top End’s giant Beetaloo Basin. The company’s planned pause was designed to allow its reservoir shales to release more gas. The same technique proved successful in a sister well that targeted the same formation within the EP187 permit.

Buru Energy says commercialisation of its Rafael gas-condensate discovery in Western Australia’s Canning Basin will service the Kimberley’s power needs at reduced capital expenditure through phased development. It says the development is viable for all contingent resource volumes as it moves ahead with de-risking subsurface uncertainties and firming up volumetric estimates, with an imminent 3D seismic survey to be followed by appraisal well drilling next year.

Galan Lithium says its new Catalina tenement in Argentina’s “Lithium Triangle” could add between 500,000 and 1.5 million tonnes of lithium carbonate equivalent at between 953 and 988 milligrams per litre lithium to its Hombre Muerto West resource. Management says a well-drilled 500m to the south of Catalina hit lithium grades in the target range and believes it may extend into its exclusively-owned ground.

Perth-based 88 Energy has bolstered its 100 per cent-owned Peregrine oil project in Alaska, adding two new reservoir intervals to its Harrier prospect, with 180.1 million barrels of oil as a best-case estimate. Basin modelling has also revealed that Harrier sits in an area of good reservoir quality and will be tested by the drillbit as a priority.

Galan Lithium has revealed details of a deal which it says has given it exclusive ownership of the vast Catalina tenements at its Hombre Muerto West lithium project within South America’s “Lithium Triangle”. Management says it has secured ownership of the Argentinian ground that has been at the centre of a long-standing dispute by issuing 9.76 million shares to the private owner.

Triangle Energy will ramp up its oil and gas chase after receiving $15 million from Pilot Energy for the sale of its share in the Cliff Head oilfield and carbon reinjection joint venture in waters off the Dongara coastline in Western Australia’s Mid West. The consideration will be paid in three stages and is expected to be completed early next year.

Javelin Minerals believes new assays from two of its projects in central New South Wales indicate the company is drilling the same ultramafic rock that mining giant Rio Tinto valued at $21 million, just 4km away. Management considers its Husky and Malamute projects to have excellent prospectivity for scandium and rare earths, in addition to precious, base and battery metals.

Godolphin Resources has applied for a huge 112-square-kilometre package of prospective rare earths ground next to its 94.9-million-tonne Narraburra project going 739 parts per million total rare earth oxides in New South Wales. The company believes its world-class mineralisation may extend into its new ground, which it plans to actively explore once the application is approved by the NSW Government.

Perth-based Surefire Resources has unlocked the door to the main stage for global battery and LED markets by confirming 99.99 per cent pure alumina in testwork, using waste rock from its Victory Bore vanadium deposit, about 400km east of the Western Australian port of Geraldton. High-purity alumina is a highly-specialised product and commands a tasty price of about $30,000 to $45,000 a tonne.

Perth-based explorer Emu NL is poised to drill a network of clay-filled, rare earths-prospective channels up to 6km wide and down to 100m in depth at its wholly-owned Condingup project near Esperance on Western Australia’s picturesque south coast. Outcropping source rocks proved fertile and the company plans to drill its clays in September, with assays due in October.

Buru Energy has commissioned 200 square kilometres of three-dimensional seismic data over its 100 per cent-owned Rafael gas-condensate discovery in Western Australia’s Kimberley region, as the company takes aim at an appraisal drilling campaign. The survey will assist the company in de-risking reservoir factors in a bid to progress its commercial case for its potentially large-scale discovery.

Auric Mining has the first gold pour from its Jeffreys Find gold project near Norseman in Western Australia at its fingertips, with management confirming it had started milling its first batch of ore. The company’s first 30,000 tonnes of ore will be processed at the Greenfields Mill in Coolgardie by end of this month, with another 100,000 tonnes waiting at the mine ready for trucking.

Godolphin Resources has launched a two–hole, 550m diamond-core drilling campaign at its 100 per cent-owned Goodrich-Yeoval porphyry copper-gold project in NSW to test targets below historic drilling that hit the two minerals. The company expects to complete its drilling program later this month, with assay results due to be returned by the end of this quarter.

Godolphin Resources has received almost $600,000 in exploration tax credits for this financial year, following a successful application to the Australian Federal Government’s Junior Minerals Exploration Incentive (JMEI) program. The credits will support exploration across the company’s enviable landholding in the Lachlan Fold Belt in NSW, where it this month increased its rare earths resource grade by 126 per cent at its Narraburra project.

Perth-based Neometals says its indirectly-owned subsidiary Novana Oy and Glencore International have penned an offtake agreement to lock in the exclusive sale of battery metal vanadium for five years. Glencore will buy all of the vanadium product, sourced from Finnish steel slag, from Novana starting in January, 2026. It will also continue to provide technical guidance throughout the vanadium recovery project.

Everest Metals’ stock jumped 50 per cent after it revealed that three deep diamond holes drilled to follow up newly-imaged targets at its Revere gold project suggested 8.5km of continuous mineralisation up to 5.7 per cent copper and 4.2 per cent zinc. The company says initial XRF results and logging indicate a mineralised system similar to Sandfire Resources’ world-class DeGrussa copper–gold mine.