Black Canyon (ASX:BCA) has bolstered its manganese holdings with a maiden JORC 2012 Mineral Resource Estimate (MRE) of 103 million tonnes @ 10.4% manganese across the KR1 and KR2 deposits in Western Australia.
The company reports the KR1 MRE stands at 79Mt @ 10% manganese in the indicated category, while KR2 sits at 24Mt @ 11.9% manganese (inferred).
Black Canyon, which has a $9.23 million market capitalisation, says delivery of the KR1 and KR2 MREf brings the global MRE across the Balfour Mineral Field including Flanagan Bore to a total of 275Mt @ 10.3% manganese containing 28.4Mt of manganese. The global resource is classified as 36% measured, 55% Indicated, and 9% Inferred for 28.4Mt of contained manganese.
According to Executive Director Brendan Cummins, Black Canyon now holds more manganese than any company in the state only 2.5 years after listing.
“The increased mineral resource scale across the Balfour Mineral Field, enables the Company to revisit the Scoping Study completed on the Flanagan Bore Project that evaluated Production Targets of 36.1 Mt @ 11.7% Mn over a 20-year mine life, generating a pre-tax NPV8 of $134M and pre-tax IRR of 67%.
Having multiple mineral resources will allow the company to investigate a multi-pit operation with single processing site or a single pit/plant operation in addition to reviewing throughput size.”
The company confirms it is working to finalise additional MREs for both the Damsite and Balfour East deposits, along with an exploration target estimate at the Pickering Creek deposit.
Black Canyon notes validated results from reverse circulation (RC) drilling completed in July this year were used to inform the resources for both KR1 and KR2.
The aforementioned drilling was completed under the supervision of specialist consultant Greg Jones, who is employed by IHC Mining.
Black Canyon has a consolidated and ‘significant’ landholding totalling 2,400km-square in the Balfour Manganese Field and across the Oakover Basin in Western Australia.
As of 30 September 2023, Black Canyon had $1.872 million cash and cash equivalents at hand, according to its latest quarterly report.
Write to Adam Drought at Mining.com.au
Images: Black Canyon
