Golden Deeps data review unearths uber-rich gallium in Namibia
Golden Deeps chief executive officer Jon Dugdale said: “The identification at Nosib of more high-grade gallium, alongside other critical metals such as copper, vanadium, germanium and antimony has enhanced the potential value of this polymetallic discovery.”
Golden Deeps’ move to highlight the gallium potential at Nosib comes at a time when China – responsible for 98 per cent of world production – has created a hiatus in the critical metals market by recently slapping an export ban on various metals, including gallium, antimony and germanium.
Prices have shot higher as the rest of the world scrambles for alternative sources of the metals, leaving companies with inventories of these metals – such as Golden Deeps – in the box seat.
The world-class Otavi Belt is no stranger to base metal developments with associated gallium, germanium and antimony. Often regarded as elephant country, the rich belt includes deposits such as the massive Tsumeb mine, 40 kilometres to the west of Golden Deeps’ grounds.
Tsumeb famously delivered 27 million tonnes at a tasty 4.3 per cent copper, 10 per cent lead, 3.5 per cent zinc, silver grading at 95g/t and 50g/t germanium.
Mining at Tsumeb has closed, however, Chinese-based Sinomine is showing renewed interest in the resource by reportedly ploughing US$223M (A$371M) into processing the remaining 3MT slag heap at site, with grades of 254g/t germanium, 139g/t gallium and 7.1 per cent zinc.
A little further up the road, the Kombat mine contains a 12.5Mt copper resource grading at 2.6 per cent and has also reported highly anomalous germanium and antimony within its deposit.
A second-phase drill program is being planned to extend known mineralisation and test deeper targets. In parallel, Golden Deeps will continue metallurgical test work and resource modelling to better define Nosib’s gallium and associated metal potential.
When all the data has been crunched, Golden Deeps will incorporate the gallium into its current JORC resource estimate for Nosib, which stands at 707,600t grading 1.06 per cent copper equivalent. The gallium is expected to significantly enhance the project’s valuation.
With gallium front and centre in global supply chain strategies and Golden Deeps rapidly advancing a high-grade, near-surface deposit in a strategic jurisdiction, the company is well-placed to play a significant role in the future of critical metals production.
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