Gippsland focuses on world-scale projects which have been over-looked by major resource groups. Projects which have undergone detailed exploration and which have the potential to be brought into production quickly are a prime target for the Company. Gippsland's success in this area is due in part to the Company's philosophy of entering into equitable joint venture arrangements with overseas nationals. The Company's prime assets are the 40 million tonne Abu Dabbab and the 98 million tonne Nuweibi tantalum-tin projects located in the Central Eastern Desert of Egypt, adjacent to the western shore of the Red Sea.
Gippsland looks to confirm Abu Dabbab tin deposit potential with trial mining program
Gippsland (ASX: GIP, FRA: GIX) will conduct a trial mining program for an extensive alluvial tin deposit contained within the 20 square kilometres Abu Dabbab Exploitation Licences in Egypt.
Gippsland would want to take full advantage of the current tin price which stands at near a record of US$29,895.00 per tonne on supply concerns. The price of tin has nearly doubled within a year.
The program is a prelude to full-scale mining that will involve on-site processing of more than 1000 cubic metres of material. Gippsland plans to commence mining during 2011, subject to the results of the trial mining.
The program is aiming for confirmation of the recoverable grade of tin and related minerals, re-evaluation of recoverable resources based on a lower cut-off grade, validation of the simple conceptual process flowsheet and the development of commercially sized equipment design and specification criteria.
The company intends to commence commercial operations at the earliest opportunity with a view to exploiting the resource over a 12-month operating time frame, subject to a successful outcome of the trial mining program.
A trailer mounted alluvial separator has been ordered from South Africa and is expected to be delivered to site late in the current quarter. Crushing and screening facilities are being sourced from within Egypt.
Gippsland completed a new resource estimation in 2008, after re-evaluating Soviet sampling data, identifying an Inferred Resource containing 759t of tin metal.
Given the current high tin price and the high cutoff grade of 1.2kg/m3 used by the Soviet-Egyptian team in their earlier evaluation of the material, a significant proportion of the overlying alluvium will likely yield commercial quantities of cassiterite and wolframite.
This should result in a significant proportion of the low grade overburden being converted to the Inferred Resource status.
As a prelude to the trial mining, a program of size analysis of the alluvial material will commence in early February in order to optimise screen size selection.
