PERTH (miningweekly.com) – Junior explorer Intermin Resources has announced a resource of 2.5-billion tonnes, grading 0.32% vanadium pentoxide for its Richmond project, in Queensland, making it one of the largest vanadium deposits in the world.
The company noted that the resource remained open in all directions and was amenable to low cost, opencut mining, with the resource located only 15 m from surface, and hosted in a soft marine sediment.
Intermin MD Jon Price told shareholders on Tuesday that the project was also located close to existing road, rail and port infrastructure.
“With vanadium prices reaching ten-year highs on the back of tightening supply and surging demand in the grid-scale battery market, Richmond has the potential to become a major supplier of vanadium to the energy storage and steel markets.”
Intermin in September last year completed a joint venture (JV) agreement with Chinese-backed AFX Vanadium, under which that firm could earn up to a 75% interest in the project by spending A$6-million by 2021. The spend will include a feasibility study.
Price said that with the release of the global resource, work by the JV would focus on the shallow higher-grade Lilyvale prospect, with work to include the completion of initial metallurgical testwork, infill drilling, a scoping study, as well as preliminary discussions with potential offtake partners, and statutory approvals.