Galan Lithium Limited (ASX: GLN) continues to make strong progress at its 100% owned Hombre Muerto West (HWM) Project in Catamarca Province, Argentina.
As planned, ponds construction for the pilot plant has commenced and progressing well with the aim for the pilot ponds system to be operational in Q1 2022. The ponds will be filled with HMW’s brine to continue with the tests of the evaporation process targeting high-grade lithium concentrations of 6% Li and low impurities.
The construction of the new temporary camp at HMW is well advanced and it should be operational early January. Once completed, Galan will have access to two fully functional camps (the other at Candelas) to support the ongoing activities associated with the HMW studies. A larger, permanent camp will be completed during 2022.
A new rotary rig, sourced under a new contract with a local Argentinian company, has commenced drilling at Rana de Sal with a second rig (diamond drilling) planned to arrive in early January 2022. If required, Galan has the option to bring in a third rig depending on the drilling progress made during January.
Importantly, the drilling campaign continues to follow the hydrogeological planning and recommendations from our highly experienced lithium brine consultants from WSP in Chile and SRK in Australia and Argentina.
The company expects to complete the drilling campaign during H1 2022 and then have an updated HMW resource.
Galan has also recently engaged Quantec Geosciences to undertake a comprehensive geophysical survey technique known as transient electromagnetics (TEM) at all of the HMW tenements. The new data will complement Galan’s previous data sets with an aim to generate new drilling targets, as well as assisting the delineation of the brine extensions at the Project.
Along with this new line of work, Galan intends to follow up with a passive seismic campaign which is expected to begin during the summer of 2022. The seismic data would further assist with the hydrogeological study to delineate the extension of the lithium brines and the depth of basin at the Project.
Managing Director, Juan Pablo (JP) Vargas de la Vega, said the combination of the drilling campaign and geophysics will give Galan more robust data which is central for HMW’s Feasibility Study is expected to formally commence soon.
“We are very excited with the great progress we are making at HMW. Our efforts and vision are solely focused on getting the Project online and becoming a lithium producer as soon as technically possible,” he said.
“The Board and I are extremely proud of our teams’ accomplishments in both South America and Australia during the past 12 months. 2021 has been a year of strength, transformation and consolidation for Galan and we look forward to 2022 and providing our shareholders with further value by being part of this decisive time where the world is transitioning into a cleaner global economy driven by new electric vehicles powered by lithium batteries.”
For further information please visit: https://galanlithium.com.au/
