Venture Minerals (ASX:VMS) has posted “record breaking ultra high-grade” results from the Jupiter Rare Earths prospect in Western Australia.
The $19.89 million market capitalisation company has intersected 48m @ 3,025 parts per million total rare earth oxide (TREO) from recently completed stage one resource definition drilling.
Managing Director Andrew Radonjic says: “These record breaking ultra high-grade REE clay results, for Jupiter, place us well above our peers in terms of both grade and scale.
What’s incredible is that these results are not isolated. They confirm consistent grades over 2,000ppm TREO in broad widths of 20m to 30m in 96% of the holes and that is sitting within zones of around 60m over 1,000ppm TREO.
We have lots of newsflow to come, with further results pending for our maiden resource drill program. This drilling is widely spaced and down the track we will be working on infill drilling with the potential to uncover more impressive grades.
Most drilling will be shallow aircore and RC, so it’s highly cost-effective. Keep in mind that these results cover a small area of our enormous, 40km-square target and you can certainly understand that Jupiter is shaping up to be an incredibly impressive project.”
The result, generated from drillhole BRRC071 within its Brothers Project, is the ‘highest grade’, clay hosted rare earth element (REE) intersection in Australia and validates geophysics.
Other notable results include hole BRRC031 and 074 with assays up to 10,266 parts per million (ppm) and 20,538ppm TREO, respectively.
Results demonstrate consistent ‘high-grade’ zones of 20m to 30m widths over 2,000ppm TREO in 96% of holes. Venture notes the ‘high-grade’ zones sit within ‘broader’ zones up to 60m grading over 1,000ppm TREO.
Along with the ‘high-grade’ zones, Venture reports it has also encountered ‘high-grades’ of magnet rare earth oxides (MREO) up to 3,288ppm neodymium, 788ppm praseodymium, 674ppm dysprosium, and 101ppm terbium in conjunction with ‘extremely low’ thorium and uranium.
Assays for the remaining 57 holes are pending. Venture notes the results cover only a fraction of the 40km-square Jupiter target.
Drilling consisted of 29 aircore drillholes and 52 reverse circulation drillholes covering a combined 5,074m.
The Brothers project sits in regional Western Australia close to infrastructure with a nearby bitumen highway and gas pipeline on route to the ‘major’ port of Geraldton 300km away.
Venture Minerals is an explorer and developer focused on uncovering ‘world-class’ deposits to meet the global demand for critical minerals vital to the green energy transition.
As of 30 December 2023, Venture Minerals had $2.072 million cash and cash equivalents at hand, according to its latest quarterly report.
Write to Adam Drought at Mining.com.au
Images: Venture Minerals
