Graphite play Battery Minerals to proceed on Victorian gold-copper acquisition
Battery Minerals new project is close to the historic 5Moz Stawell gold mine in Victoria and hosts numerous historic workings.
Battery Minerals (ASX: BAT) revealed it will complete the acquisition of Gippsland Prospecting, the owner of a gold-copper project in Victoria, with the tenement now granted.
The ground is adjacent to the Thursday’s gossan copper project owned by Stavely Minerals (ASX: SVY).
Stavely Minerals’ Cayley Lode, 30km to the southwest of the new acquisition, is continuing to produce “outstanding” copper, gold and silver intercepts, Battery Minerals noted.
Battery Minerals’ focus has been what it calls two “world-class” graphite projects in Mozambique, Montepuez and Balama Central.
The company has decided that, while it continues to pursue cost-effective financing for its graphite projects, it will move into gold and copper in Victoria.
The licence held by Gippsland Prospecting is host to a “significant” strike length of the Stavely volcanic belt and the Stawell gold corridor.
The acquisition of Gippsland and its EL6871 tenement includes a 40km-plus strike length within the volcanic belt and, additionally, a similar strike length within the gold corridor.
Ground close to large gold projects
The new ground is 5km to the east is the historical 5 million ounce Stawell gold mine.
In addition, just 6km to the east is the Resolution Lode, owned by Navarre Minerals (ASX: NML), which Battery Minerals says continues to generate strong, consistent grades of gold mineralisation.
And within EL6871 lies the historic Moyston gold mine that produced 75,000oz of gold at an average 22g/t.
The 809 square kilometre licence area also contains “numerous” other historical workings.
Chairman David Flanagan said the acquisition delivers Battery Minerals gold prospects including high-grade intercepts in historical drilling, untested workings and surface soil sampling.
These, he added, were not far from the highly profitable Stawell mining operation.
“We also have a volcanic belt which is almost untouched by modern exploration that has delivered outstanding copper, nickel and gold exploration success on the adjoining tenements.”
Ready to go on graphite
Battery Minerals has a field crew in Victoria that is ready to begin work upon completion of the deal.
Meanwhile in terms of the graphite projects, Battery Minerals has so far produced high quality flake graphite at multiple laboratories.
Subject to completion of project financing, the company intends to begin producing flake graphite concentrate at Montepuez at the rate of 50,000tpa.
Together, the two projects have the capacity to produce more than 150,000tpa of flake graphite.