Panther Metals has been buoyed by initial testing results on samples from its Coglia nickel-cobalt project in the WA Goldfields that returned final nickel extraction levels of 92.6 per cent.
Panther says the high pressure acid leach, or “HPAL” testing conducted by ALS Global Laboratories indicated the potential to further upgrade the nickel grade through beneficiation. The majority of the contained material was less than -38μm in size, with the higher-grade nickel residing in ultra-fine fractions.
Cobalt extraction was confirmed at 73.9 per cent.
The test work was based on a blended sample obtained from six drill holes from Panther’s maiden drilling program, which was completed last May and located across the strike of the current resource area and from varying horizons of mineralised material.
Panther Managing Director and CEO, Daniel Tuffin said: “This initial round of HPAL testing from the Coglia Nickel-Cobalt Project has returned fantastic results. With a final recovery of 92.6% nickel, these results confirm that the laterite nickel mineralisation at Coglia falls within the industry-accepted processing recovery range.”
“Additionally, most of the higher nickel grades are in the finer size fractions, which with further study may prove that beneficiation processes such as scrubbing, cyclones and/or screening could potentially remove the need for milling.”
Panther is now awaiting a further report from ALS and also will engage independent experts for review.
Tuffin says that whilst the company’s focus for the next phase of exploration at Coglia remains on drilling and expanding the current resource, it will continue testing and further studies in parallel to support a future pre-feasibility study, including expanded HPAL bench test work programs.
Coglia is one of three Panther projects south-east of Laverton, the other two being Mikado and Merolia. Coglia is situated 240km north-east of Kalgoorlie and 70km south-east of Laverton with Glencore’s Murrin Murrin nickel-cobalt plant 70km to the west via road. To Laverton’s west sits Panther’s Red Flag nickel sulphide project.
The maiden drill program at Coglia started not long after Panther listed on the ASX in December 2021 and its maiden resource was released in June last year. Coglia has returned drill intercepts including 6m at 2.5 per cent nickel and 808 parts per million, or ppm cobalt.
Panther engaged ALS to carry out an initial round of HPAL testing on the back of completing its first 6,000m RC program at the Coglia nickel-cobalt project, which resulted in a maiden inferred mineral resource estimate modelled on both RC and air-core drilling.
At a 0.5 per cent nickel grade cut-off, that estimate was set as 70.6 million tonnes at 0.7 per cent nickel and 460 parts per million cobalt for 476,000 tonnes nickel and 32,200 tonnes cobalt contained. It easily exceeded the upper limit of 50m/t set in the previous JORC exploration target.
The price of nickel, a critical ingredient of the green energy revolution, is notoriously volatile and is often subject to fears of supply shortages. It was on a tear in the first half of 2022 and rose more than 250 per cent following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. It fell sharply earlier this month when news emerged of expanded nickel plate production in China.
Though Indonesia is the world’s leading producer, in economic nickel reserves Geoscience Australia ranks Australia as number one with 24 per cent of global reserves.
Australia is also one of the world’s top five nickel-producing countries and in 2019 produced about 180,000 tonnes. The world’s demand for nickel last year totalled around 3 million tonnes and would be expected to increase sharply as a result of a surge in electric vehicle production. Panther Metals will be hoping Coglia can play its part in meeting that increased demand.
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By Matt Birney
