Exploration and development company Canadian Palladium has substantially increased the size of its East Bull deposit, west of Sudbury, Ontario, with an updated mineral resource estimate.
The estimate includes indicated resources of 16.5-million tonnes at 0.93 g/t palladium-equivalent for 492 100 oz of palladium-equivalent ounces and inferred resources of 16.3-million tonnes at 0.99 g/t for 519 600 palladium-equivalent ounces.
These totals include pit-constrained mineral resources at a C$15/t net smelter return (NSR) cut-off and out-of-pit mineral resources at a C$50/t NSR cut-off.
“We are extremely pleased to have reached this important size threshold for the East Bull deposit. In comparison to the previous estimate, our new resource estimate total indicated palladium ounces are 1.3 times the previously estimated ounces that were all inferred, plus the new additional inferred palladium ounces are 1.4 times the previously estimated inferred ounces, resulting in an improvement in ounces by a factor of approximately 2.7,” said CEO Wayne Tisdale.
He added that the predominant contribution of palladium to the NSR value per tonne made East Bull a valuable asset that had a favourable configuration for openpit mining and benefitted substantially from its location in the Sudbury mining camp.
“In addition, as shown by our recent drilling results, the project still has considerable exploration upside,” said Tisdale.
The updated resource estimate is the culmination of a successful 20 000 m drilling programme by Canadian Palladium that has substantially increased the size of deposit since the initial mineral resource estimate was completed in 2019.