Bulls N' Bears (Commercial Content)

After setting out in search of lithium and gold, Kula Gold fired a second volley of auger holes into its Rankin Dome project in WA’s Southern Cross region and struck a welcome cluster of rare earth elements. The program uncovered some impressive results across the tenure with 70 per cent of the 375 samples registering more than 115ppm total rare earth elements with two samples peaking at 1080ppm.

The succession baton is being readied at Buru Energy who has appointed Beach Energy executive Thomas Nador as CEO. Founder and Executive Chairman Eric Streitberg flagged an orderly transition to the role of Non-Executive Chair. Streitberg says he is looking to focus on overseeing the monetisation of the company’s expansion opportunities.

Perth-based Surefire Resources is gearing up for 4000m of RC drilling at its Yidby gold project in WA’s Mid West region. The program is expected to kick off as early as next week and will build on the legion of wide gold hits produced at the project since its acquisition in August 2020.

Infinity Lithium Corporation's wholly-owned subsidiary, Extremadura New Energies has sealed a collaborative agreement with Asemtraex – the Association of Transport Entrepreneurs of Extremadura – that will see the duo team up to encourage economic development in the freight sector of Cáceres, Spain. According to the company, the work could foster economic growth, drive down unemployment and generate career opportunities for the township.

With the backlog at the labs clearing up, the assays are now flowing for Estrella Resources as the explorer continues its methodical drilling across various targets at its Carr Boyd nickel and copper sulphide project, 80km northeast of Kalgoorlie. Most assays from the phase 4 RC drilling campaign have now been received and the company says the results confirm nickel-copper enriched sulphide plume along most of the T5-Broonhill pyroxenite.

Mineral explorer Kairos Minerals has beefed up its management with Peter Turner to take the reins as Managing Director and Klaus Eckhof taking a seat as Non-Executive Chairman. The addition of the duo reflects the company’s commitment to accelerating the exploration campaigns at its WA lithium and gold projects. Turner’s appointment will be effective from May 23rd and Eckhof has already commenced his role.

Okapi Resources says its wholly-owned subsidiary Usuran Resources has been granted state approval to dive into a drilling program at its Tallahassee uranium project in Colorado, USA. The company says the permit will allow its subordinate to plunge up to 18,200m of drilling across 60 holes at the operation with the intent of bolstering the existing resource.

Mineral explorer Panther Metals says final assay results from drilling at its Coglia project in the Laverton region of WA have returned its best nickel and cobalt grades at the operation to date. The banner results include a 1m intersection going 3.97 per cent nickel from 64m with a 1m copper hit grading 7900 parts per million from the same depth.

Brightstar Resources has high hopes for a new RC drill program at its Cork Tree Well project at Laverton, WA where previous drilling delivered a 12m intersection grading 3.47 grams per tonne gold. The company is targeting the northern extensions of the main Delta lode whilst also chasing down new Delta 2 targets as it looks to grow its JORC resource.

A hydrometallurgical study conducted at Murdoch University in Perth has delivered robust processing results for Venus Metals Corporation and its Youanmi vanadium deposit in WA’s Mid West region. The study was commissioned in 2019 to develop an integrated process flow sheet for the extraction of vanadium, iron and titanium. Importantly, a provisional patent application has been lodged and accepted with IP Australia.

Great Southern Mining has locked down an initial term 21-year mining lease over its Southern Star prospect in the Duketon project area where drilling continues to progress with over 50 per cent of its 5,200-metre program now complete. Drilling quartz dolerites on strike with previous hits, the company expects assay results this month.

Mineral-explorer Si6 Metals has fired up an air core rig at its Monument gold project in WA’s Laverton gold district. The campaign will build upon an initial phase of drilling undertaken in late 2021 where 18 targets were confirmed as prospective for bulk tonnage gold mineralisation. The current round of exploration will see 140 holes over 5000m plunged into five target areas.

A large, multi-element geochem survey for Queensland focussed Superior Resources has delivered results from its wholly-owned Bottletree copper prospect. Multiple, strong targets for a planned aggressive drilling program into the cores of at least three porphyry intrusions have been identified as well as several large zones of copper mineralisation that will feel the pressure of the drill bit.

Results from Askari Metals’ recent soil sampling program have grown the extent of mineralisation at the company’s Barrow Creek lithium project in the NT. The mineralised zone containing multiple lithium-caesium-tantalum type pegmatites has now been extended to an area of 2.8km by 1.9km and remains open in all directions. Notably, significant surface strike extensions of the fertile pegmatite zones identified in the first phase of exploration have been made.

Calidus Resources’ recent spin-off Pirra Lithium has produced another grab bag of high-grade results from its latest rock-chip sampling and mapping program at the company’s Spear Hill discovery in WA’s emerging East Pilbara lithium field. The recently identified pegmatite has been mapped out over 2.5km in strike with assays yielding up to an impressive 2.75 per cent lithium oxide.

Kula Gold’s first pass soil sampling over its wholly-owned Brunswick project in WA’s southwest has returned gold, platinum, palladium and copper anomalies over a magnetic feature it has dubbed the Hippy Lady prospect. The company believes the target is prospective for Julimar-style mineralisation and is now planning a follow up infill soils program to home in on future drilling locations.

Surefire has used a historical data review to light up 15 priority gold and nickel targets at its newly granted Perenjori West tenure, 300km northeast of Perth. The under explored tenure lies within the West Yilgarn nickel-copper-PGE province that has been the recent focus of intense exploration following the discovery of Chalice Mining’s world-class Julimar PGE deposit.

Wiluna Mining’s foray into drill-testing the down-plunge extensions of high-grade gold mineralisation at the historically-significant East Lode has come up trumps, returning an impressive 9.4 metres at 4.87 grams per tonne gold that included 1.8m delivering 9.74g/t of the precious yellow metal. The mineralisation was reportedly intercepted 200m below historical workings and the current mineral resource envelope.

King River Resources says salt roast test work with Murdoch University has delivered exceptional first-pass extraction results of up to 92 per cent vanadium concentrate using ore from its Speewah deposit in the Kimberley region of WA. The company is currently hammering away on a new green process flowsheet to produce high-purity vanadium pentoxide, vanadium electrolyte, titanium dioxide and metallic iron from the deposit.

Mineral explorer Aurumin has completed a lithium-focused drilling program into its Mt Palmer gold project in WA, coinciding with the return of positive soil sample results. The 12-hole program drilled 1212m into target B of the Vickers Find South prospect and intersected pegmatites ranging from one to 40m in thickness in 11 of the 12 holes. Assays to reveal the lithium content are currently pending.

88 Energy’s hunch reservoirs charging an adjacent oil discovery might continue into its Icewine project acreage on the Alaskan North Slope looks to have paid off with third-party mapping interpreting three target reservoir units extending into the company’s permit areas. An in-depth petrophysical re-evaluation of Icewine-1 and the broader area has been carried out by independent petrophysical consultants.

Mining software developer K2fly has sealed a one-year deal worth $2.12 million with BHP to roll out its ground disturbance solution data management system to the mega-miner’s iron ore operations in the Pilbara region of Western Australia. The company now provides its ground disturbance solution to the three biggest iron ore players in WA, with Rio Tinto and Fortescue Metals Group also on the roll call.

Junior explorer Twenty Seven Co has unveiled a slew of gold-in-soil geochemical anomalies at its Yarbu gold project, 160km northeast of Southern Cross in Western Australia. The latest round of auger drilling has confirmed three previous anomalies etched out from last year’s program along with highlighting a new target area with samples grading up to 92.7 parts per billion gold.

Shares in DiscovEx Resources soared more than 20 per cent on intraday trading after its JV partner Carnaby Resources seized another stunning set of drill results from ongoing work at its Greater Duchess copper-gold project near Mt Isa in Queensland. Amongst the most recent figures was a 42m section going 3.6 per cent copper and 0.5 grams per tonne gold from 63m.

Five years ago Calidus Resources pulled off what many thought was an impossible task – the bringing together of multiple disparate parties who owned gold leases in the Pilbara within cooee of each other. Since then, Calidus has exquisitely executed a strategy of drilling out those leases, pulling together a resource and a reserve and this week, the company managed to achieve what many others could not – a maiden gold pour.

DiscovEx Resources has revealed a highly-encouraging gold in soil anomaly through geochemical sampling at its Edjudina project 250km northeast of Kalgoorlie, WA. The delineated zone exhibits more than 50ppb gold continuously for 1.3km with some results going as high as 100ppb. The company’s newly-defined zone has been coined the Spartan prospect and sits within a broader 1.8km anomaly of 25ppb gold.

Terrain Minerals has been granted three new exploration tenements covering 320 square kilometres of the highly prospective ‘rare earths province’ near Esperance. The largest new tenement is surrounded on three sides by Meeka Gold Limited that recently released results showing large areas of regolith hosted rare earths, including a strong and extensive anomaly adjoining Terrain’s ground to the south.

Multi-element explorer Askari Metals has wrapped up a project-wide exploration campaign at its Yarrie lithium project in WA, 50km northeast of Marble Bar. Viewing the project through a geological lens, the company previously revealed several significant and high-priority targets that have now all been inspected and sampled in the field. In total 129 rock and 238 stream sediment samples were collected.

Perth-based plastic pipe manufacturer Polyline Pipe Systems is gearing up to disrupt the industrial pipe industry with its revolutionary hi-tech “mobile pipe extruder”. The company is looking to list on the ASX next year and has already secured at least one ASX-listed mining client who says its onsite pipe manufacturing technology has “significantly reduced” transportation costs.

The Democratic Republic of Congo Minister of Mines has signed a ministerial decree to award a mining licence to AVZ Minerals and its flagship lithium and tin deposit – hailed as one of the largest undeveloped hard rock lithium deposits in the world. The inking of the decree was the last of the procedural hurdles ahead of the official award of the licence the junior explorer so eagerly awaits.

A pit re-optimisation, the inclusion of vanadium credits and a change of plant location has turbo-charged Toro Energy’s plan for its WA based Lake Maitland uranium project, leading to a potential 48 per cent hike in uranium production over the life of mine to 23.5 million pounds from 15.8 million pounds and potential vanadium oxide production of 12.2 million pounds.

Aldoro Resources is just days from starting to drill at its high-grade rubidium-lithium pegmatites at the company’s Wyemandoo project, 60km southeast of Mt Magnet in WA. Previous surface sampling returned high-grade rubidium to 1.82 per cent and lithium to 1.08 per cent. Metallurgical studies are underway to determine the most cost-effective beneficiation process and extraction efficiencies.