JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – The latest addition to Aim-listed Stellar Diamonds' development portfolio, the Baoulé project, in Guinea, could be a game changer for the firm, chairperson Lord Peter Daresbury said on Thursday.

A joint venture partnership in December with Guinea-incorporated Société Tassiliman allowed Stellar to earn-in 75% of the project through a $5-million expenditure, with the option of buying the remaining 25% at fair market value.

While Stellar aimed to deliver a maiden diamond resource on the newly acquired Baoulé kimberlite pipe project by the end of 2014, historical data pointed to a potential multimillion-carat resource at “substantially high diamond values”, the West Africa-focused diamond development company said.

Stellar targeted a three-million-carat resource based on a minimum grade of 13 carats per hundred tonnes (cpht), but the Baoulé pipe, at a depth of 300 m, had the potential to host a resource of about 22-million tonnes of kimberlite, with indications that a grade of between 13 cpht and 40 cpht could be achieved.

“Our confidence in being able to deliver a resource as significant as three-million carats is heightened by the large volume of data available from previous operators who held the licence from 2000 to 2004,” said Daresbury.

The company’s internal diamond value estimation reached a “conservative” $200/ct, while a nearby diamond resource was defined with values in excess of $400/ct and had reported the presence of 100 ct stones.

“The only way to ascertain the diamond grade and value with any certainty is [by] conducting our own bulk sampling and we are currently making preparations to collect an initial 1 000 ct diamond parcel for this purpose using our existing diamond plant and resources,” Daresbury explained.

Meanwhile, the robust economics emerging from Stellar’s flagship high-grade Tongo project, in Sierra Leone, was “justifying the board's decision” to advance the project to the feasibility study phase, said CEO Karl Smithson.

The development of the Tongo kimberlite dyke project remained a priority for Stellar, which planned to undertake further drilling in 2014 to increase the current resource from 1.1-million carats to over 1.5-million carats.

The group expected to complete the definitive feasibility study by the end of the year.

“We will then be in a position to consider the various financing options for mine construction with a view to potentially starting production by the end of 2015,” Daresbury concluded.