New Age Metals Inc. (TSXV:NAM); (OTC:NMTLF) is making solid progress on its Pre-Feasibility Study (PFS) and exploration activities at the River Valley Palladium Project near Sudbury, Ontario.
Since the previous update was announced in August, the Mineral Resource Estimate of River Valley has been updated and progress has been made advancing the mineral processing and metallurgical, geomechanical and geotechnical, and environmental and community relations work components of the Pre-Feasibility Study.
Concurrently, NAM completed an initial phase of drilling at the Banshee Zone and excavated a new exploration trench near the Dana South Zone, to further explore the palladium potential in this area.
Pre-Feasibility Study
Updated Mineral Resource Estimate
The updated Mineral Resource Estimate by P&E Mining Consultants Inc.was announced in October 2021 and will underpin the ongoing Pre-Feasibility Study.
At cut-offs of CDN$15/t NSR (pit constrained) and CDN$50/t NSR (out-of-pit), the Mineral Resource Estimate consists of: 89.6 Mt grading 0.54 g/t Pd, 0.21 g/t Pt, 0.04 g/t Au and 0.06% Cu, or CDN$47.58 NSR/t in the Measured and Indicated classifications; and 94.3 Mt grading 0.35 g/t Pd, 0.16 g/t Pt, 0.03 g/t Au and 0.06% Cu, or CDN$31.69 NSR/t in the Inferred classification.
Contained metal contents are 2.3 Moz Pd+Pt+Au in the Measured and Indicated classifications and 1.6 Moz Pd+Pt+Au in the Inferred classification.
The updated 2021 Mineral Resource Estimate is based on all historical and 2020 diamond drilling, revised mineralised domain modelling, inverse distance grade interpretation methodology, and higher overall metal prices, particularly for palladium.
At the CDN$15/t NSR cut-off, the pit constrained Measured & Indicated Mineral Resources total of 89 Mt grading 0.79 g/t Pd+Pt+Au (2.3 Moz) reported herein significantly exceeds the potentially mineable resources total of 78 Mt grading 0.79 g/t Pd+Pt+Au (2.0 Moz) reported in the 2019 Preliminary Economic Assessment (PEA) of River Valley.
Overall, the Pre-Feasibility Study as led by P&E will consider optimised mine production and mineral processing rates, based on this potentially more valuable Updated Mineral Resource Estimate than that which underpinned the 2019 PEA.
Four additional mineral processing and metallurgical sampling holes totalling approximately 802 m, have been drilled in 2021; one each on the Dana North, Dana South, Lismer North and Lismer Ridge Zones.
Each of the holes was drilled downwards to intersect as much mineralization as possible for mineral processing and metallurgical testwork by SGS Canada Inc. (Lakefield). HQ-size core was retrieved, logged and sampled metre-by-metre by NAM. Eight-hundred 1-m long ½ core samples plus blind QC samples were delivered to SGS for processing, assaying and variability testwork.
At this date, SGS have advised that all of the assay results should be available in the next few weeks. The samples will then be composited for grade (low, average, high), mineralised zone and rock type variability testing, in order to optimise metal recoveries. This work will build on previous studies by SGS in 2012 and include, for the first time, systematic rhodium recovery determinations. The testwork programme at SGS is being managed on behalf of NAM by D.E.N.M Engineering Ltd.
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