Si6 Metals has secured a second license at its joint-venture (JV) Caldera rare earths project in the mining region of Minas Gerais in Brazil and will charge a drill-rig into the area to kick-off its latest program.
The company has secured a further 54 sq km plot of highly prospective land to push ahead with its search for high-grade rare earths at its JV project located within the renowned Poços de Caldas Alkaline Complex in Minas Gerais.
The newly granted land borders that of Meteoric Resources’ exciting Caldeira rare earths project, where high-grade ionic-clay rare earths have been discovered and an inferred mineral resource of 409 million tonnes at 2626 parts per million total rare earth oxides has been announced.
Si6’s project is also near Viridis Mining’s compelling Colossus project where Viridis has produced several stunning ionic-clay hits as high as a ridiculous 24,894ppm and 25,075 ppm. It has also discovered even higher grades at depth.
The second license has been granted for three years with a drill program set to commence over the whole license area. Si6 considers it prospective for ionic-adsorption clay-hosted (IAC) rare earths.
The drill program will comprise 10 auger holes with 150m spacings and will run concurrently with the 26-hole auger drill program on the company’s existing southern Caldera project license. The drilling will test the depth of the anomalous rare earths results returned from surface sampling.
Si6 Metals managing director Jim Malone said: “We are delighted that our second license at the Caldera Project has now been granted which allows us to commence a second exploration program at this highly prospective rare earths region. This license sits inside the highly prospective Poços de Caldas Alkaline Complex in Minas Gerais and abuts Meteoric Resources’ ionic-adsorption clay rare earths areas where we aim to replicate their exploration success.”
The company has confirmed saprolite clay-hosted rare earths mineralisation along the edge of the Poços de Caldas Alkaline Complex. It says ionic-adsorption clay deposits generally have lower grades near surface and improve with depth, with the magnet based rare earths average grades typically increasing with deeper drilling.
Management says sampling returned results up to 933 parts per million total rare earth oxides with about 24 per cent of the total being the higher value “magnet” rare earth oxides.
Further high-grade results were uncovered in the eastern portion of the project area, with four results averaging 843ppm TREO.
Importantly, the high-value magnet rare earths that are typically used in electric vehicle motors comprised on average 94 per cent of the lucrative elements neodymium and praseodymium.
The highly sought-after neodymium and praseodymium rare earths are a primary component of industrial magnets, widely used in electric and hybrid motors and generators, clean energy technologies and wind turbines.
The 50 per cent JV is with Foxfire Metals and covers a highly prospective suite of Brazilian rare earths, lithium and gold projects.
Si6 also has an interesting nickel-copper-silver play in the southern African country of Botswana.
Previous assays from its Dibete prospect delivered solid hits such as 6.15m at 7.2 per cent copper and 182 grams per tonne silver from 24.85m, including 0.5m at 10.8 per cent copper and 281g/t silver. Another 1m hit came in at a serious 13 per cent copper and 168g/t silver.
The company’s Maibele North deposit has a 2.38m tonne inferred resource, boasting a mixed bag of multiple high-value minerals including 0.72 per cent nickel, 0.21 per cent copper, 0.08g/t platinum, 0.36g/t palladium, 0.04g/t of high-value rhodium, 0.05g/t ruthenium and 0.10g/t gold.
Si6’s Botswana project sits within a prolific nickel district and covers more than 2000 square kilometres within the highly prospective Limpopo Belt in eastern Botswana.
The Maibele North deposit is centrally located 50km from Premium Nickel Resources' world-class Selebi-Phikwe nickel-copper-cobalt-PGE mine and 80km from Norilsk Nickel’s Tati nickel-copper mine.
Si6 is developing a potentially potent mix of in-demand metals that could play a big role in the future clean-energy transition and push Si6’s name firmly in front of canny market observers.
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