Thor Mining PLC (LON:THR ASX:THR) has secured a research grant from the Australian government to help fund research of recovery processes at its Kapunda project in South Australia.
The AIM-listed miner said the A$2.8mln grant, awarded over a 30-month period, would be used to cover the costs of a demonstration of an In-Situ Recovery (ISR) process as part of its In-Situ Copper and Gold Recovery Trial at the project.
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The ISR process is currently proposed for the extraction of copper and any potential gold from the Kapunda deposit, with the information gleaned from the demonstration to be used in the potential development of multiple IS amenable projects.
Thor added that the project had the involvement of leading institutions such as the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) and Adelaide University.
Mick Billing, executive chairman of Thor, said the grant provided a “significant boost” to the Kapunda project and would help with the “acceleration of fieldwork and other technical, environmental and social studies for the project while maintaining the contributions by Thor at sustainable levels."
He added that the grant provided “substantial” funding to complete a “comprehensive field recovery trail to establish the technical viability, scale, and overall efficiencies of the project to feasibility study level."