An upgrade to Chalice Mining’s Gonneville resource earlier this year has had a flow-on effect for neighbours, with mineralisation trending into Western Yilgarn’s tenements to the west.
Chalice’s Gonneville intrusion is located less than 2.5km east of Western’s Julimar west project tenement border, with the interpreted fault and mineralisation dipping into the Julimar West permit.
The company hopes to capture some of the success that Chalice has seen in the mineral-rich area.
Western Yilgarn is currently awaiting a lease approval from the WA Department of Mines, Industry Regulation and Safety. When finalised, the company will be able to commence a staged exploration program of the prospective area.
“Our Julimar West Project continues to enjoy positive market regard courtesy of the excellent exploration effort performed by Chalice Mining,” Western Yilgarn chairman Peter Lewis said.
“This world-class mineralised zone discovered by Chalice continues to be developed through ongoing exploration. Chalice’s ASX updates such as the most recent one on 31 July 2023 strongly supports the prospectivity extending into Julimar West.”
Chalice announced a significant resource upgrade to its flagship Gonnveille deposit earlier this year.
The company revealed an open-pit and underground mineral resource of 560 million tonnes (Mt) at 0.88 grams per tonne (g/t) 3E (platinum, palladium and gold), 0.16 per cent nickel, 0.09 per cent copper and 0.015 per cent cobalt.
This amounts to 16 million ounces (Moz) of 3E, 860,000 tonnes of nickel, 520,000 tonnes copper and 83,000 tonnes of cobalt, and approximately 3Mt of nickel equivalent (NiEq) product.
This made Gonneville the second-largest underdeveloped nickel sulphide resource in Australia.
“The ~50 per cent* increase in the Gonneville resource to ~3 million tonnes of nickel equivalent is quite a remarkable achievement for the Chalice team given it is barely three years since the discovery of the Julimar complex,” Chalice managing director and chief executive officer Alex Dorsch said.
Following a $70 million capital raise in May, Chalice ramped up its exploration efforts nearby Gonneville.
Most recently, Chalice managing director Alex Dorch told the Diggers ‘n’ Dealers conference in WA that the company was now on the hunt for strategic partnerships for the development of Gonneville.