Galan to acquire James Bay lithium projects in joint venture with Redstone Resources
Galan Lithium (ASX: GLN) has entered into a joint venture agreement with Redstone Resources (ASX: RDS) to acquire the Taiga, Camaro and Hellcat lithium projects in the heart of Canada’s world-class James Bay province.
The projects cover 51.87 square kilometres and share tenement boundaries with the Corvette discovery owned by Patriot Battery Metals (ASX: PMT).
Patriot has previously reported samples from the CV8 pegmatite averaging 4.6% lithium oxide and located 1.4km north of Taiga, while the new CV13 pegmatite cluster is located 1.5km north of Camaro.
Meanwhile, basic geological reconnaissance by Axiom Exploration Group last October identified 28 prospective pegmatite dykes.
The projects will be housed within a 50:50 unincorporated joint venture with Redstone as manager.
Other parties to the deal are Canadian critical metals company Infinity Stone Ventures and two private individuals.
‘Electric avenue’ projects
The joint venture includes an option to acquire 100% of the PAK East and PAK Southeast lithium projects across 14.15 sq km of the ‘electric avenue’ region of northwest Ontario.
The projects are adjacent to the high-tonnage, hard-rock PAK project owned by Canadian junior Frontier Lithium.
PAK contains North America’s highest-grade lithium resource and is the second largest in North America by size.
Under the terms of the agreement, Galan and Redstone will pay or assume a 2% net smelter return royalty over the James Bay and PAK projects with a right to buy back 50% of each royalty by paying $1.15 million to the royalty holders.
Quality portfolio
Galan managing director Juan Pablo Vargas de la Vega said the acquisition allows the company to continue building a quality portfolio in a world-class lithium province renowned for Tier 1 discoveries.
“These joint venture projects are of high quality and situated near to excellent lithium discoveries… we are very experienced in lithium exploration and look forward to initiating work in the region,” he said.
“Securing a prospective position in two premier lithium hotspots is value accretive and complements our development and production lithium brine assets in Argentina.”
Field-based mapping program
Once the acquisition is completed, Galan and Redstone plan to conduct a field-based reconnaissance geological mapping program, including ground-based methods to determine the geometry of any lithium-bearing pegmatites at depth.
The program will assess the prospectivity of pegmatites for lithium mineralisation within the licence areas and will include a large number of known outcropping pegmatites.
The results will allow the partners to identify drill targets and plan an exploration strategy.