Western Mines Group (ASX: WMG) appears to be increasing the size of its Mulga Tank nickel project in WA’s Eastern Goldfields region with every drillhole after delivering an impressive new spot reading of 57.3 per cent nickel at a depth of 1600m.
The company says core from its latest State Government co-funded drilling reveals many visible high-grade veins and segregated sulphides within an 860m stretch. It believes the depths where it is finding the nickel signifies the potential for a massive sulphide component to be sourced due to the frequent visible veining and high-grade mineralised sections.
Management says the associated elevated levels of copper and sulphur supports its belief it is likely disseminated magmatic nickel sulphide mineralisation.
The latest deep drillhole – the first diamond hole in this year’s program – was drilled to a depth of 1722m and placed in the centre of the Mulga Tank complex between previous reverse-circulation (RC) and diamond drilling. It was designed to infill previous RC drilling, provide material for metallurgical testwork, test a possible sulphide-enriched keel in the deepest part of the complex and to assess a geophysical target.
The target is a conductive geophysical anomaly identified from a previous Mobile MT survey – an innovative and widely-used airborne electromagnetic technology.
Drilling at the deepest section encountered about 1600m of magnesium oxide ultramafic dunite, with disseminated nickel sulphides up to about 2 per cent. Blebby sulphides were also present and estimated at between 3 per cent and 5 per cent.
Western Mines is using a portable X-ray fluorescence (pXRF) device on site, with readings taken at 25cm intervals within the top 340m and at 50cm intervals thereafter.
The stellar 57.3 per cent nickel reading was the highest recorded and a broad zone of about 150m resulted in a 0.4 per cent reading from the hand-held device. The company says average nickel readings on 3718 logged ultramafic portions of the hole returned 0.35 per cent.
It expects the first assays to be returned within the next few weeks.
Sulphide mineralisation is encountered nearly everywhere we drill and this hole continued that trend with cumulatively around ~860m of disseminated and blebby sulphide mineralisation, along with frequent high-grade and high-tenor remobilised sulphide veining and large sulphide globules or segregations.
Western Mines Group managing director Caedmon Marriott
Management says a “cloud sulphide” zone was intersected in a similar position to a previous diamond-hole. Assays from the previous hole returned 96m at 0.4 per cent nickel from 1208m including 8m at 1.11 per cent nickel from 1270m.
The drillhole targeting the Mobile MT geophysical anomaly missed its mark after dropping more steeply than expected and management is considering a wedge-hole to further test the target. It also said it extracted 112kg of bulk samples to be used for metallurgical testwork.
The WA Government co-funded the drilling costs under its Exploration Incentive Scheme (EIS) after a successful application from the company, with 50 per cent of costs up to $220,000 being provided.
Nickel has major advantages when used in batteries by helping to deliver higher-energy density and greater storage capacity at a lower cost. Further advances in nickel-containing battery technology mean it is set for an increasing role in energy storage systems, helping make the cost of each kWh of battery storage more competitive.
It is also making energy production from intermittent renewable energy sources such as wind and solar, a viable alternative to fossil fuels.
Nickel is also an essential ingredient in most electric vehicle (EV) batteries. Two of the most commonly-used battery types, nickel-cobalt-aluminium (NCA) and nickel-manganese-cobalt (NMC), use 80 per cent and 33 per cent nickel, respectively. Newer formulations of NMC use a higher nickel content.
The lustrous metal’s weighting in full EV batteries jumped 8 per cent year- on-year in 2023 to average 25.3kg as carmakers continued to opt for high-nickel batteries for long-range performance and even many entry-level new models, according to Adamas Intelligence – an independent research and advisory company.
With nickel looking to continue to play a significant role in the future of the burgeoning EV market and the transition to cleaner energy, Western Mines’ growing project could soon be the envy of many of the commodity’s explorers.
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