Bulls N' Bears (Commercial Content)

An updated scoping study by PolarX for its Alaska Range copper-gold play shows a total EBITDA of US$573 million over a 9.5-year mine life at a post-construction average annual free cash flow of US$53 million. The positive study shows mining and processing are scheduled to begin with an open-pit operation at the company’s Caribou Dome site, followed by underground mining at its Zackly deposit.

BMG Resources is again cranking the drillbit, with a 36-hole air-core (AC) drill program to home in on multiple, high-quality lithium and gold targets at its Bullabulling project where anomalous lithium-caesium-tantalum pegmatites were identified in its maiden reconnaissance program. Fieldwork and geochemical analysis previously outlined lithium-bearing pegmatites within a 4km corridor and gold occurrences were also recorded at the major Coolgardie lithium and gold province.

Strickland Metals will kick off a planned heritage survey on October 9 at the company’s Yandal and Earaheedy projects ahead of a planned drill program at what it describes as a compelling but untested gold target. The company seeks heritage clearance across priority areas, with particular focus on its promising Great Western, Rabbit Well and Cowza prospects and other regional gold prospects in the Yandal project.

Brightstar Resources has made the milestone jump from explorer to producer status following the inaugural blast on the cutback of its Selkirk joint venture open-pit mine in Western Australia’s historic Menzies goldfields. Mining is expected to run for about six months, with ore being stockpiled in Menzies, and the company is anticipating its maiden gold pour early next year.

Auric Mining’s first toll milling of ore from its Jeffreys Find mine has yielded 1721 ounces of gold – and more than $5 million in revenue. The company says all mining has been completed, but a package of about 145,000 tonnes of ore is still in haulage for processing. Surplus funds are to be set aside for further development of its Munda project.

Xanadu Mines has revealed its massive Mongolian copper-gold Kharmagtai deposit is now connected to the local electric grid, paving the way for current and future construction and exploration activities. The company says its vital 35,000-volt connection to the Mongolian Southern Electricity Distribution Network is expandable and will accommodate Kharmagtai moving closer towards operational mine status.

Surefire Resources has engaged premier mining and exploration consultant Snowden Optiro to provide a mine plan, cost estimate and report for the upcoming prefeasibility study (PFS) at its 100 per cent-owned Victory Bore vanadium project in Western Australia’s Mid West region. The company expects to deliver the PFS for what it describes as its “world-class” deposit in November.

Radiopharm Theranostics has negotiated an expanded agreement with TerThera for the supply of the terbium-161 isotope to continue its fight against prostate cancer. The crucial isotope will be joined with a proprietary monoclonal antibody to form “RAD 402”, a radiotherapeutic being developed to target KLK3, a clinical cancer biomarker. Radiopharm says it could become the first KLK-based theranostic option for patients with advanced prostate cancer.

Venus Metals has uncovered two neighbouring pegmatite outcrops, with visible coarse lithium-bearing petalite running up to 4.6 per cent lithium oxide, after completing a field program at its Youanmi project in Western Australia. The program was aimed at discovering the cause of a prominent lithium soil anomaly labelled the “Deep South Target”. Results also revealed a separate assay of 3.26 per cent lithium oxide.

Brightstar Resources has its sights set firmly on building its gold resource after revealing results from its latest 2000m reverse-circulation drilling campaign at its Cork Tree Well deposit in the Laverton Gold Belt. The results include 1m at 109.6g/t from 167m and 3m at 8.7g/t from 197m and interpretations show a high probability that a 3km northerly extension to mineralisation exists, requiring immediate follow-up work.

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.

Neometals’ joint venture company Primobius has received an order from Mercedes-Benz to supply a 10-tonne per day lithium-ion battery shredding plant for the global vehicle manufacturing giant’s new recycling operation at Kuppenheim in southern Germany. The “spoke” plant is designed to recover materials that will be recycled into a planned 50,000 battery modules that will be installed into new Mercedes vehicles.

Gold Mountain’s recent trial soil sampling at its Casa Nova project in Brazil has revealed a zone it believes is anomalous in several critical elements including lithium, caesium, beryllium, tin and gallium. The company says it may represent components of a classic pegmatite-hosted lithium, caesium, tantalum (LCT) mineralised system. The trial was conducted on only a small part of the project.

Terrain Minerals has joined the frenetic exploration and drilling fray in Western Australia’s up-and-coming, clay-hosted rare earths province near Esperance. The company has joined the ever-growing rare earths search party in the area by launching a maiden proof-of-concept drilling program after securing heritage approval at its 100 per cent-owned, 320-square-kilometre Lort River project, just 50km north-west of the town.

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.

Sri Lankan government legislation designed to promote its mineral sands industry and exports has delivered a major boost for Titanium Sands and its bold development plans for its project on Mannar Island in the country’s north-east. The recent legislation was brought in to ensure local participation in adding value to related products earmarked for export.

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.

Strickland Metals has begun an induced-polarisation (IP) survey at its Great Western project, about 85km north-east of Wiluna in Western Australia, to explore a promising, but untested coincident magnetic, geochemical and gravity anomaly. The company says the structural setting at the site, which is largely masked by transported cover, is considered favourable for large, high-grade orogenic gold deposits.

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.

American West Metals has continued a winning streak at its Storm project in Canada, striking an 18m intercept of visual copper sulphides in its latest diamond drillhole. The hit extends copper mineralisation 2km from its recent Thunder zone discovery hole that yielded more than 76m of visible copper sulphide mineralisation, hinting that the company has tapped into a major belt-scale sediment-hosted copper system.

Terrain Minerals has identified multiple zones of gallium mineralisation at its Smokebush project in Western Australia’s Mid West region, less than a month after the metal sent another explorer’s share price rocketing. Drill results at the company’s Rabbit Warren and Paradise City prospects were of comparable grade to the Arizona assays that saw Gold 50’s stock jump 146 per cent.

Reimagined explorer Lithium Universe Limited will use artificial intelligence to assimilate imagery and data to assist development and optimisation of its exploration strategy at its Apollo lithium project in Canada. The company will use its AI information in concert with other geological data as part of an initial goal to fast-track exploration in its high-latitude project environment, where field-time has traditionally been restricted by the seasons.

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.

Venture Minerals has engaged Curtin University to start stage-two metallurgical testwork on its tin-rich Mount Lindsay borates. The testing follows the CSIRO’s stage-one investigation into the extraction of tin, boron and iron from tin-iron borates, conducted in a bid to enhance tin recovery and produce a high-value boron byproduct to add another revenue stream to the project.

Everest Metals has planted its foot on an extensive multi-commodity area of ground with its recent grant of six new exploration licences covering 3421 square kilometres. They are part of 15 applications in two new project areas, which have distinct but complementary polymetallic characteristics in the Georgina and Amadeus Basins, centred on Alice Springs in the Northern Territory.

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.

Positive new data has renewed the confidence of Chimeric Therapeutics in its pathway towards treating multiple types of cancer with its next generation armoured natural killer cell platform, “CHM0301”. The platform, which is being evaluated in its first clinical trial, has shown positive in vitro results in modelling human acute myeloid leukaemia and colorectal cancer by overcoming the resistance created by a tumour’s microenvironment.

Recent surveys by PolarX at its Humboldt Range claims area in Nevada have identified several geophysical anomalies coinciding with surface gold anomalies and faults within both its Black Canyon and Fourth of July projects. At Black Canyon, the survey has extended the priority drill target out to 2.7km of strike, coincident with the Rochester Rhyolite Formation – a known gold-silver host.

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.