Bushveld Minerals Limited (LON: BMN), the AIM listed, integrated primary vanadium producer, with ownership of high grade vanadium assets, has today provided a maiden Mineral Resource estimate for the Brits Vanadium Project. The Brits Project is located on Portion 3 of the farm Uitvalgrond 431 JQ, near the town of Brits in the North West Province of South Africa and is directly along strike from the Bushveld Vametco Alloys Mine (Bushveld-Vametco). The maiden Mineral Resource incorporates data from the 2018 drilling campaign comprising 26 drill holes over a total of 2,967m of diamond drilling.
The Mineral Resource is reported in accordance with the 2012 edition of the Australasian Code for Reporting of Exploration Results, Mineral Resources and Ore Reserves and is classified into the Indicated and Inferred Categories in Table 1 below.
Key Highlights
· The aggregate Inferred and Indicated Mineral Resource distributed across the three seams (the Lower, Intermediate, and Upper Seams) is reported as 66.8Mt at an average grade of 1.58 per cent V2O5 in magnetite, at a cut-off grade of 20 per cent magnetite in whole rock for 175,400 tonnes of contained vanadium.
· The Indicated Mineral Resource tonnages account for 67 per cent of the total combined Mineral Resource and stand at 44.9Mt with an average grade of 1.59 per cent V2O5 in magnetite for 115,600 tonnes of contained vanadium across the three seams.
· The Lower Seam represents a major portion of the total combined Mineral Resource tonnages at the cut-off grade of 20 per cent, with55.5 Mt at an average grade of 1.58 per cent V2O5 in magnetite for 137,000 tonnes of contained vanadium. This represents approximately 83 per cent of the total combined tonnage of the maiden Mineral Resource.
· Within the combined Mineral Resource, the Intermediate Seam has the highest grade of the three seams at 1.76 per cent V2O5 in magnetite though the tonnages are low at the current cut-off grade of 20 per cent magnetite in whole rock.
· A geological trend of decreasing grade in vanadium for magnetite-rich layers from west to east in the Bushveld Complex accounts for the lower grades on the Brits Project in comparison to the grades at the operating Vametco Mine.
· The Mineral Resource is reported up to a depth of 150m below surface and based on the drilling on the western and central blocks of the farm Uitvalgrond Portion 3 which extends over a strike length of approximately 1.65km to the most eastern fault where the last line of drilling was completed. As such there is potential to increase the resource on the remaining eastern unexplored portion of the farm on a strike length of 1km.
Fortune Mojapelo, CEO of Bushveld Minerals Limited, commented:
“We are pleased to be able to report solid results confirming that we have a high-quality asset at the Brits Project, where its average grade of 1.58% V2O5 in magnetite is among the highest in the world.
“This represents an important step in the development of Brits – as we recently detailed our path to producing over 8,400 mtV per annum and Brits provides the optionality for additional ore feed for the Vametco plant and, if required, concentrate feed for the Vanchem plant.”
