Public Company News

Great Southern Mining has been awarded a Western Australian Government Exploration Incentive Scheme grant for its East Laverton nickel project. The EIS grant will co-fund up to $220,000 for RC and diamond drilling of bedrock conductors prospective for massive and disseminated nickel sulphides. The two conductors identified from electromagnetic surveys present compelling targets for Nova/Bollinger nickel-copper and Voisey Bay nickel style deposits.

The final chapter of resource definition and expansion drilling at American West Metals’ West Desert project in Utah has ended with a bang after the latest two holes sunk at the venture delivered strong visual copper, zinc and molybdenum mineralisation. The venture believes its latest phase of drilling caps an impressive campaign that has underlined the quality and scale of the operation.

Surefire Resources says an updated beneficiation scoping study for its wholly-owned Victory Bore vanadium project, 530km northeast of Perth in WA, has underlined the economic viability of the venture. The company has its hands on a 151 million tonne resource at 0.44 per cent vanadium pentoxide, 25 per cent iron and 6.73 per cent titanium dioxide at the operation.

Cyclone Metals has started its maiden New Zealand exploration program at its newly-acquired Mareburn and Macraes South gold projects. The projects are located adjacent to OceanaGold Corporation's 10-million-ounce Macraes gold deposit currently producing 155,000 ounces per year. Geochemical sampling will target known gold mineralisation and favourable cross-cutting structures that may mimic the 80-million-ounce Carlin trend in Nevada.

Torian Resources has bolstered its heavy rare earths portfolio after a new discovery at its Mt Stirling project in Western Australia. The company believes ongoing work at the venture has identified additional yttrium oxide mineralisation and has labelled the new prospect Wishbone. Interestingly, the finding is within earshot of its recently announced Yttria heavy rare earths prospect.

St George has announced a major expansion of exploration for its four WA based projects. Work at Mt Alexander will test new nickel-copper-PGE targets and extensions to existing high-grade shallow deposits. The hunt for Winu style deposits at its Paterson project is planned to start in May. Whilst at the company’s Ajana and Broadview projects exploration will target Nova/Bollinger and Julimar style mafic intrusion hosted nickel-copper-PGE targets.

Blackstone Minerals has bolstered its engineering horsepower with GR Engineering Services as it heads towards the delivery of a definitive feasibility study into its upstream Ta Khoa Nickel Project. The ASX-listed addition is hailed as a ‘Tier 1’ process engineering, design and construction advisory company and will man the role of Blackstone’s primary consultant.

Gold-focused Horizon Minerals and joint venture partner Richmond Vanadium Technology have settled on the path forward for the development of the duo’s shared vanadium venture in central north Queensland. The pair have agreed Richmond will be the dedicated IPO vehicle to drive the project – that Horizon holds a 25 per cent interest in – to an ASX listing in September or October.

Infinity Lithium subsidiary Infinity GreenTech has inked a deal with Murdoch University that will see the duo form a partnership to commercially test work on a lithium chemical conversion process called ‘GreenTech RPK’. According to the company, a victory in the space could allow it to breathe new life into previously-unviable lithium deposits.

Strickland Metals says it has an emerging large gold system at its Millrose project as the explorer continues to find gold aplenty. The first hole north of known resources returned 54m at 1.8 g/t gold from 130m including 23m grading 2.4 g/t gold. Drilling beneath existing resources returned 95.5m going at 2.0 g/t gold including a high-grade intercept of 8m at 14.6 g/t gold from 215m.

Gold and rare earths explorer Meeka Gold Limited is aiming to bolt on another gold discovery to match its flagship Murchison gold project. The company is continuing to drill out its Circle Valley project in the Albany-Fraser Mobile Belt in WA’s south with the aspiration of transforming the project into one to match the nearby Tropicana mine.

Shares in gold explorer DiscovEx Resources vaulted more than 28 per cent on intraday trading following an announcement it had executed two binding-option agreements with Rio Tinto that allow the mining behemoth to acquire 100 per cent of the iron ore rights for four tenements within the Sylvania project, 15km southwest of Newman in Western Australia.