Mining

Golden Deeps returns to Professor and Waldman cobalt-silver projects amid cobalt rebound

Go to Lorna Nicholas author's page
By Lorna Nicholas - 
Golden Deeps ASX GED cobalt silver Canada Waldman Professor

自2021年初以来,LME钴价已从33,000美元/吨上涨37%,至45195美元/吨。

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As electric vehicle demand accelerates, Golden Deeps (ASX: GED) will restart work at its Professor and Waldman cobalt-silver projects in Canada.

Golden Deeps acquired the assets in December 2017 when the cobalt price was high with initial exploration undertaken in early 2018. This generated rock chip samples grading up to 0.623 grams per tonne gold, 200g/t silver and 1.01% cobalt. Anomalous lead was also identified at the projects.

The projects are less than 5km from the town of Cobalt, Ontario and lie within the historic Cobalt Mining Camp.

According to Golden Deeps, the assets have similar geology to previous cobalt and silver mines in the region.

With both silver and cobalt prices on the rise, combined with analyst reports electric vehicle adoption is also increasing, Golden Deeps explained it was time to return its attention to Professor and Waldman.

Professor and Waldman

As part of its renewed interest in Professor and Waldman, Golden Deeps has secured a local contractor familiar with the area.

The contractor will work with Golden Deeps to collate previous exploration data and assist with target generation for a geophysical survey and drilling.

To the east of Professor are several former cobalt-silver mines including Cobalt Lode, Christopher, Brady Lake and Beaver-Temiskaming.

These mines are within 800m to 2.5km of Golden Deeps’ Professor claims.

About 500m east of Golden Deeps’ other project Waldman is the Silverfields mine. Historically, this mine produced 17.795 million ounces of silver with cobalt credits.

From the geological information it has at hand, Golden Deeps’ theory is the Silverfields’ mineralised vein structure potentially extends into the Waldman claim area.

Waldman also hosts a historic mine which produced 33,525oz silver and 2,066 pounds of cobalt between 1910 and 1930.

Golden Deeps noted this production was equivalent to a resource of 52.6t at 1.78% cobalt and 637oz/t silver.

Rising cobalt price amid high EV adoption forecasts

Since the start of the year, the cobalt price has rocketed 37% from US$33,000 per tonne on the London Metal Exchange to US$45,195/t on Thursday 4 February.

Contributing to the price rise are bullish forecasts in the EV sector where cobalt is a critical ingredient in the most common lithium-ion batteries that are used to power these vehicles.

Golden Deeps also noted that global cobalt supplies were tight.

A recent report from analyst Morningstar stated EVs will account for one out of every five cars sold by 2030.

Meanwhile, Bloomberg claims in its New Energy Finance Report that EVs will comprise 55% of all new car sales by 2040 – with a third of the global fleet expected to be electric by this time.

Spot silver was last trading at US$27.06/oz – up from a low of US$11.12/oz when the COVID-19 pandemic shook the world in March 2020. Since then silver steadily climbed to reach a high of US$29.37/oz in August last year. It has hovered close to that high ever since.