PERTH (miningweekly.com) – Dual-listed junior Thor Mining will spin out its Australian copper projects into a newly listed company called Enviro Copper.
Thor inked a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with privately held Environmental Copper Recovery (ECR) and Environmental Metals Recovery to merge their respective interests in the Kapunda and Moonta copper projects, in South Australia, creating Enviro Copper.
Under the MoU, Thor will relinquish its rights to a 60% interest in ECR, and instead acquire a 25% pre-listing interest in Enviro Copper for a total funding of A$600 000.
The ASX- and Aim-listed company will also hold the right to acquire a further 5% seed capital interest in Enviro Copper for A$400 000.
“This is a very exciting development in our copper strategy, potentially adding significant scale to our copper interests by bringing the Moonta copper project together with our existing interest in the Kapunda copper project, into a potentially large in-situ recovery (ISR) focused copper business, initially in Australia,” said Thor executive chairperson Mick Billing.
“While Kapunda is comparatively more advanced, the Moonta project, albeit at an earlier stage, provides potential for a much larger, and longer-term copper production entity.
Kapunda has a current resource estimate of 119 000 t of contained copper, while Moonta has an exploration target of between 238-million and 310-million tonnes, grading at between 0.18% and 0.23% copper for between 428 000 t and 713 000 t of contained copper.
Billing said that a key strategic target for Enviro Copper would be the timely development of the Kapunda project into production, demonstrating the operational viability of ISR. This experience would then be applied at the larger-scale Moonta project, and into additional new project opportunities acquired by Enviro Copper.
“The opportunity for eligible Thor Mining shareholders to have a priority investment opportunity in the new vehicle is seen as a core ingredient in the establishment and listing of this new entity,” Billing said.
The agreement is conditional on the execution of a binding farm-in and joint venture agreement, and on the satisfaction of a due diligence over the Moonta project acquisition from ASX-listed Andromeda Metals by Environmental Metals Recovery.