Aim- and TSX-listed Horizonte Minerals on Tuesday announced that it had a new high-grade resource that could serve either one of its two production centres in Brazil – Araguaia or Vermelho.

The Serra do Tapa nickel deposit has a National Instrument 43-101-compliant mineral resource estimate in the measured and indicated category of 70-million tonnes, grading 1.22% nickel, at a 0.9% nickel cutoff.

“The resource is high grade and scalable, using a 1.2% nickel cutoff grade it delivers over 41-million tonnes of mineral resource in the measured and indicated category grading 1.4% nickel,” said CEO Jeremy Martin.

The company’s mineral resource now totals 280-million tonnes with 3.5-million tonnes of contained nickel and 155 000 t of contained cobalt and is located in one of Brazil’s largest mining district – Carajas.

Horizonte has the potential to develop two mining centres within trucking distance of each other. The first is in the south at Araguaia, where it is developing a ferronickel operation to produce about 14 500 t/y of nickel with the Stage 1 plant expandable to 29 000 t/y of nickel.

The second production centre, in the north, is at the Vermelho nickel cobalt project which has the capacity to produce 15 000 t/y to 18 000 t/y of nickel and associated cobalt. 

“Now we have additional high-grade material from the Serra do Tapa deposit which could serve either operation,” Martin said.

A significant portion of high-grade saprolite within the Serra do Tapa deposit is amenable to the rotary kiln electric furnace process route to produce ferronickel, potentially providing a further high-grade feed source for the Araguaia project.

Further, Horizonte reported that work on Araguaia was focused around advancing the project finance and the recruitment and selection of the project development team. The company noted that the recent increase in the nickel price to $16 000/t boded well for the Araguaia project, which used a price of $14 000 t/d in its feasibility study.

At Vermelho, the prefeasibility study is at an advanced stage and is expected to be announced to the market before the end of September. 

Horizonte advanced 22% on the London exchange to 2.75p a share and 12% on the Toronto exchange to C$0.045 a share.