GWR Group Limited (ASX:GWR) has decided to accelerate activities associated with the Prospect Ridge Magnesite Project in Tasmania after a company geological teams visit to site provided an additional level of confidence in respect the availability of local resources available to support and advance the project.
The company has engaged leading environmental and engineering consultants pitt&sherry to assist in accelerating approvals and review a proposed infill drilling programme planned for the Arthur River deposit. pitt&sherry are engineering specialists within Tasmania and it is planned to initiate a logistics and infrastructure study in the near future.
The aim of the drilling will be to increase the size and upgrade the classification of the existing JORC 2012 Inferred Mineral Resource estimate of 25 million tonnes of fresh magnesite grading 42.4% MgO to an average depth of 100m below the surface at a cut-off of 40% MgO.
GWR expects to have drilling approvals in the coming months, and in the meantime will continue to engage with potential offtake partners for a DSO product and also towards a low-cost, zero waste, high-quality and eco-friendly downstream process that can add significant value to the end product.
A recent site visit lead by our founding Director, Mick Wilson has only reinforced our initial confidence in the advanced Prospect Ridge Magnesite project,” Chairman, Gary Lyons, said.
“The support the team was shown by government agencies and private enterprise has been very encouraging. We believe GWR can apply its experience in bulk commodity DSO mining and in addition identify technology partners to provide us with the opportunity of benefiting from downstream processing.
“GWR is excited to have entered the ‘green sector’ and the company will be capitalising on the plethora of data and knowledge gained from the site visit to revise Feasibility Studies conducted on the project and embark on an aggressive exploration campaign to increase the size of the resource and upgrade its classification.”
Mr Lyons said the GWR geological team was buoyed by their recent meetings which included:
- Mineral Resources Tasmania and Department of State Growth: Where it was confirmed that a significant amount of historical data is available for the project area, including 8,500m of diamond drill core (50 drill holes) which is stored at the Government Core Library, and can be accessed by GWR. This core could provide a valuable resource for GWR for future metallurgical test work.
- The University of Tasmania and the Centre for Ore Deposits and Earth Sciences (CODES): Where discussion focused on the Prospect Ridge project and work being undertaken by CODES on critical minerals within Tasmania.
- Process Technologies Australia: Experienced metallurgical consultants who assisted with previous metallurgical test work on the project as undertaken by both Jindalee Resources Limited and Beacon Hill Plc.
- The Port of Burnie: one of the States key deep-water Ports and the largest general cargo port in Tasmania. o Desktop and Transport Studies will commence following the site-visit and the company will look to update the feasibility study over the project.
