Australian Vanadium (ASX:AVL) continues to drill out what aims to be a JORC resource at its Blesberg Lithium-Tantalum-Feldspar Project in the Northern Cape Province of South Africa.
The company is currently undertaking a 4,000 metre reverse circulation drill program, which is to be followed by a 500 metre diamond core program.
AVL is advancing the project towards feasibility to extract feldspar and lithium, beryl and tantalite by-products.
Vincent Algar, managing director, commented: “Blesberg offers AVL shareholders the opportunity for niche, high quality products in a market where most players can only supply a lower quality product.
“The high purity mineralisation of the Blesberg pegmatites flag the potential for the Northern Cape area as a world class region for future mineralised pegmatite discovery and production.”
Drilling and trenching update
18 reverse circulation drill holes have been completed to date for 1,400+ metres, successfully intersecting the pegmatite zone in all holes.
Spodumene, tantalite and beryl have been identified, with high quality feldspar visible in all intersections.
Exploration activity has been complimented successfully with the excavation of rows of trenches to identify the pegmatite under areas of sand cover.
The new pegmatite exposure is being targeted by drilling in the current program.
This increases the known strike length of the main Noumas 1 zone to over 1 kilometre in length.
Trenching and soil sampling have also been conducted on the P2 area, which will be targeted after the current Noumas P1 program.
Drilling will continue in May and June and is expected to finish in July.
Assays from the first batch of submitted samples are pending and a second batch has also been submitted for processing.
A new drilling contractor has also been brought in to increase drilling speed.
Blesberg Project
The Blesberg Project is located 80 kilometres north of Springbok in the Northern Cape Province of South Africa.
It lies at the western end of the Northern Cape Pegmatite Belt.
The deposit is one of the largest known economically mineralised and exploited pegmatite deposits in the pegmatite belt.
AVL’s objective is to establish a production facility at Blesberg that maximises the value of the pegmatites.
This will include high volume ceramic grade feldspar and quantities of high value by-product spodumene, beryl and tantalite.
The project is serviced by a major sealed road to the east within 6 kilometres of the project area along an unsealed government road.