Image pays $12m for monster mineral sands play

ASX-listed Image Resources has picked up an astounding 84Mt of contained total heavy mineral sands and a staggering 75Mt of contained valuable “heavy” minerals in a $12 million cash deal with Sheffield. The new project comes gift wrapped with a massive 5.8Bt mineral resource going 1.4 per cent total heavy minerals. It represents an incredible 20-fold increase in the overall tonnes accessible by dry mining for Image and a more than 700 per cent increase in the total tonnes of contained heavy minerals.

After completing the deal with cash from existing reserves, Image is now holding the keys to the McCalls heavy mineral sands project located 100 kilometres north of Perth, within proximity to its own Boonanarring mineral sands mine. The McCalls project consists of four exploration licences across two project areas and sits as sits within three kilometres of Image’s existing operations in some parts.

According to the company, the resource includes 7.1 per cent zircon plus rutile and 82 per cent ilmenite plus leucoxene, averaging 63 per cent titanium oxide, likely saleable as chloride grade ilmenite.

The acquisition is a large one by any measure and Image sees the massive resource base as fodder for potential future, multi-decade production opportunities. The company will also consider adding value through the production of synthetic rutile.

The mineralisation at McCalls is shallow and comes to the surface in some areas, presenting a low overall strip ratio that is potentially minable using a lower cost hydraulic method according to the company.

Image Resources Managing Director and CEO, Patrick Mutz said: “….McCalls is literally in our back yard at Boonanarring. While the overall grade is low, this can be managed with an appropriate economy-of-scale coupled with lower cost mining and processing methods. Importantly, while a number of other massive mineral sands deposits are challenged with finer grain minerals, lower grade TiO2 minerals, and higher uranium and thorium, McCalls contains medium grain minerals, has high quality TiO2 and low uranium and thorium.”

Image says the sheer scale of the new project lends itself to the production of 500Mt subsets within its 5.8Bt resource – something that will become part of a future feasibility study.

Importantly, the subsets would be curated to have higher heavy mineral grades and low strip ratios.

Image also highlights the potential for evaluating full mineral separation and the possible establishment of a new synthetic rutile production facility using cutting-edge robotic technology and green hydrogen.

Not withstanding the new acquisition, Images plans have not changed for the development of its Atlas deposit, due to kick off following the anticipated end of production at its Boonanarring operation in early 2023.

Additionally, the feasibility study on its Bidaminna project is continuing with Image anticipating the development of the project following positive results.

The company says its initial plans for the new acquisition include an in-house reassessment of the mineral resources and securing exploration access to potentially develop a geophysical model that could assist in predicting higher grade internal regions.

Image has gone to its sizable saddle bags to fund the new massive resource and in doing so has avoided the need to issue more dilutive stock whilst at the same time underwriting its mining operations north of Perth potentially well into the future.

Is your ASX-listed company doing something interesting? Contact: matt.birney@businessnews.com.au