Premium Resources hits significant grade at Selebi North in Botswana

Two holes drilled outside the resource estimate area at the past-producing nickel-copper-cobalt Selebi North underground mine in Botswana delivered grades as high as 1.73% copper, Premium Resources (TSXV: PREM) reported Monday.Drill hole SNUG-24-172 on the South Limb cut 14.2 metres grading 1.73% copper, 1.66% nickel and 0.08% cobalt starting from 623.8 metres downhole.The second hole, SNUG-24-144, returned 14.4 metres averaging 1.44% copper, 1.24% nickel and 0.06% cobalt starting 610.3 metres downhole on the N2 Limb.“This exploration drilling program is designed to increase the mineral resource of the Selebi North deposit by drill testing large, highly conductive BHEM (borehole electromagnetic) plates located down plunge and interpreted to represent massive sulphide mineralization,” Sean Whiteford, the company’s president, said in a release.The Selebi North mine, 410 km north of the nation’s capital Gaborone, opened in 1990 and operated for 26 years. The mine was developed to a depth of 970 metres and 13.9 million tonnes grading 0.74% nickel and 0.66% copper were extracted before it was put on care and maintenance in 2016.Follows initial resourcePremium completed an initial resource estimate for Selebi North last August outlining 3 million indicated tonnes grading 0.9% copper and 0.98% nickel for 27,000 tonnes contained copper and 29,000 tonnes nickel. Inferred resources measure 5.83 million tonnes grading 0.90% copper and 1.07% nickel for 52,000 tonnes contained copper and 62,000 tonnes nickel.The Selebi North deposit is part of the company’s Selebi mines project, which also consists of the Selebi Main deposit. The Selebi Main mine began production in 1980, and like Selebi North was suspended in 2016 due to a failure in the processing facility.Selebi Main hosts 18.9 million inferred tonnes grading 1.69% copper and 0.88% nickel for 319,000 tonnes contained copper and 165,00 tonnes of nickel.The company plans to update the resource estimate for both deposits in the first half of this year, Premium said in a corporate presentation last November. It also intends to complete upgrades to the Selebi North and Main shafts and start building a new mill in the second half of next year with the goal of commissioning the mill and starting production in 2027-2028.At midday Premium’s Toronto-listed shares were down 2.5% at C$0.40 apiece, giving it a market cap of about C$74 million ($51.5m). Over the last year its shares have traded in a range of C$0.33 to C$1.66.Weiter zum vollständigen Artikel bei Mining.com Weiter zum vollständigen Artikel bei Mining.com