Meagan Evans

Lindian Resources has delivered the highly-anticipated maiden mineral resource estimate for its Kangankunde rare earths project in Malawi, coming in at 261 million tonnes at a cracking grade of 2.19 per cent TREO. Including 5.7 million tonnes of contained rare earths of excellent grade, it positions the project among the world’s biggest deposits and paves the way for offtake agreements and mine development.

Quantum Graphite has acquired the complete set of flake graphite purification technology from The Sunlands Energy Company, providing what it says is a commercialisation path for products from its Uley flake graphite mineral deposits in South Australia, to advanced industrial manufacturers in North Asia and Europe. The company plans to deliver superior natural flake products across all applications.

Having recently pivoted into an emerging lithium hotspot in Brazil, Gold Mountain is promptly exploring its significant package of tenements as it eyes its first drilling program by the year’s end. The company’s exploration to date has identified 250 pegmatites, with multiple soil and rock-chip sample results pending. Gold Mountain is just starting its lithium climb.

Everest Metals’ Rover project is set to be hit with the drillbit this week when Rio Tinto Exploration kicks off a seven-hole, 1400m reverse-circulation (RC) program. The new campaign will target potential pegmatite-hosted lithium mineralisation beneath weathered outcrop at the project’s northernmost tenement in the Central Yilgarn region of Western Australia – an area undergoing a resurgence in exploration.

Shallow exploration drilling at Xanadu Mines’ Kharmagtai copper-gold project in Mongolia has uncovered the potential for new discoveries outside its existing mineral resource area. Management says its new work has validated its belief that Kharmagtai hosts undiscovered porphyry deposits as the company progresses its prefeasibility study and updates its resource, with a view towards production.

A scoping study on Auric Mining’s Munda gold deposit in Western Australia’s Goldfields region supports the potential for open-pit mining and the processing of ore at an existing toll treatment plant, highlighting the potential for “significant accumulated cashflow”, even at low gold prices. The company’s study also outlined a cashflow surplus of $76.9 million under the base-case scenario.

Aurumin set the drillbit spinning this morning on the first of its four planned diamond drill holes at its Mt Palmer project in Western Australia. It is targeting lithium-bearing pegmatites where it believes the geology is analogous to Wesfarmers’ and SQM’s Mt Holland lithium deposit, 65km to the south. The design of the diamond drill holes was awarded government funding for half of the costs.

DiscovEx Resources can tick heritage surveys off its to-do list ahead of planned drilling at the Contact prospect within its Sylvania project in Western Australia’s Pilbara region. Drilling at the 2.5km-long target area is due to begin in August, in addition to geophysics targeting copper-gold and lead-zinc mineralisation at the project’s Prairie Downs fault zone.

Kairos Minerals continues to generate highly-promising lithium targets at its 100 per cent-owned Roe Hills project in Western Australia’s Eastern Goldfields region. The company’s optimism has been boosted ahead of a planned initial 5000m of reverse-circulation drilling across its growing pipeline of targets in the rapidly-emerging lithium province that hosts Global Lithium Resources’ renowned 32.7-million-tonne Manna lithium project.