Patriot Battery Metals reports strong lithium results from drilling at Corvette property
Patriot Battery Metals will begin drilling at Corvette again in January next year with up to five rigs to be operating in February.
ASX newcomer Patriot Battery Metals (ASX: PMT) has reported core assay results for 12 additional drill holes at its wholly-owned Corvette lithium property located in Canada.
The company’s primary focus area has been the CV5 pegmatite, located approximately 13.5 kilometres south of the regional and all-weather Trans-Taiga Road and powerline infrastructure in the James Bay region of Quebec.
Drilling targeted mineralisation at shallow to mid-level depths over a significant strike length of the pegmatite, returning best intercepts of 113.4m at 1.61% lithium oxide from 162.1m, including 38m at 2.17% lithium and 28.6m at 2.31% lithium.
Individual samples
One of the drill holes returned 20 individual samples grading more than 3% lithium oxide including two adjacent samples averaging 2m at 6.41% lithium and containing a single spodumene crystal of approximately 1.8m.
It is believed to be the largest crystal discovered to date at the property.
A high-grade pegmatite in another hole was interpreted to continue to surface with an intercept of 39.9m at 1.30% lithium oxide from 69.9m, including 18m at 2.28% from shallow depths.
Best results from other holes were 60m at 1.52% lithium oxide from 25.3m, including 18m at 2.16% from shallow depths proximal to the CV5 pegmatite outcrop; 42.2m at 1.52% lithium oxide from 77.4m; 17.8m at 2.53% lithium oxide from 160.5m; and 29.1m at 1.21% lithium oxide from 183.4m.
Tantalum
Strong grades of tantalum continue to be returned from the CV5 pegmatite with individual 1m samples grading more than 1,000 parts per million tantalum pentoxide coming from six of the 12 holes.
High-grade lithium-tantalum intervals included 18m at 2.16% lithium oxide and 316ppm tantalum pentoxide, and 42.2m at 1.52% lithium oxide and 300ppm tantalum pentoxide.
The prevalence of tantalum at the Corvette property is believed to be widespread and Patriot expects its zonation will be more clearly defined once all drill core assays have been returned.
The company said tantalum continues to be a secondary commodity of strong interest at Corvette and recovery into a marketable concentrate will continue to be explored as flowsheet studies are advanced.