Lincoln Minerals (ASX: LML) has kicked off exploration at its Yallunda uranium project on South Australia’s Eyre Peninsula by launching a comprehensive field reconnaissance and sampling program to focus on a 7km-long anomaly pinpointed from research into historic geophysical and geochemical datasets.
The fieldwork will include soil, calcrete, and rock-chip sampling, with results expected by late next month. The findings will help guide management’s next steps, including a gravity geophysical survey, as it works to assess the uranium potential.
The company’s renewed focus on the uranium mineralisation follows a review it conducted earlier in the year to look into exploration data from between 2007 and 2011. It highlighted promising uranium prospects that remain underexplored due to a focus on iron ore and graphite at the time.
A 2011 airborne radiometric data survey carried out by Eyre Iron – Lincoln’s joint venture (JV) partner at the time – originally identified the anomaly. By marrying that data with a similar survey recently conducted by the SA Department of Energy and Mines, the company has been able to confirm grades in excess of 150 parts per million uranium from the 7km anomalous zone.
The area’s geological features are dominated by uranium-laden “hot granites” that sit close to significant graphite mineralisation, which acts as a reducing agent and is a key marker for uranium deposits.
Lincoln has also been busy preparing a prefeasibility study (PFS), which is due shortly, on its nearby Kookaburra graphite project (KGP) in efforts to become the first company to reboot graphite production in Australia.
By targeting a 2 million-tonne high-grade core zone at surface grading 15 per cent total graphitic carbon (TGC), the company expects to speed up the development pathway at a much lower upfront capital cost, prior to directing the free cash flow towards expanding and excavating the much bigger 12.8 million-tonne resource.
Additionally, Lincoln is positioning itself to grab a seat at the green steel transition table after lodging ambitious plans to develop its massive 1.1 billion-tonne Green Iron magnetite project just up the road.
With a diversified focus on uranium, green iron and graphite, the company is giving itself plenty of ponies in the race in the hope that at least one or two of its projects can become prized stallions.
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