PERTH (miningweekly.com) – ASX-listed junior Liontown has reported a maiden 21.2-million-tonne lithium/tantalum mineral resource at its Kathleen’s Corner and Mt Mann deposits, at the Kathleen Valley project, in Western Australia.
MD David Richards said on Tuesday that the delivery of a maiden mineral resource was a major milestone for the company and provided a strong foundation for its aspirations to develop a suite of Australian battery metal assets.
“The key features of the deposits are its high grade, at 1.4% lithium oxide, the significant tantalum component, the fact that the mineralisation starts fresh from surface and will likely be amenable to openpit mining, and its location on granted mining leases close to established, high quality infrastructure.”
Richards said that the other encouraging feature of the project was that, based on the preliminary metallurgical results, the deposit comprises predominantly spodumene-hosted lithium mineralisation, which is likely to be amenable to conventional processing.
“All of these positive characteristics, combined with the fact that we are confident the resource will continue to grow with further drilling, make Kathleen Valley a significant asset for Liontown, which we believe will become the cornerstone of our strategy to develop a high-quality battery metals business.”
Liontown will now start negotiations with potential offtake and strategic partners, as the company progresses to the next stage of project development.
“With follow-up drilling also well advanced at our Buldania project, near Norseman, and first assays expected soon, we see a great opportunity to build high-quality hard rock lithium resource base that is likely to grow significantly over the coming months.”