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Augustus Minerals (ASX: AUG; “Augustus” or the “Company”) is pleased to advise that its early ongoing assessment of the Ti-Tree project has yielded positive results in the identification of potential ironstones that could host rare earths in several locations totalling more than 15kms of strike length.
Highlights
- >10kms of ironstone potential identified through mapping of geophysics and satellite imagery that could host rare earth elements (REE).
- Elevated radiometric thorium signatures over the mapped ironstones display a strong correlation, similar to the Hastings Technology Metals Yangibana project and Dreadnought Resources Yin project Mineral Resources immediately to the north of Augustus tenements.
- Ironstones in the Gascoyne often host very high concentrations of the two most sought after rare earth elements, Neodymium and Praseodymium, widely used in the manufacture of permanent magnets.
Ironstones in the Gascoyne region already host significant deposits of rare earth elements. Dreadnought Resources1 announced a rare earth Inferred Mineral Resource in ironstones of 4.8Mt @ 1.67% TREO whilst Hastings Technology Metals Ltd announced a combined Measured, Indicated and Inferred Mineral Resource at the Yangibana project of 29.93Mt @ 0.93% TREO in ironstones2.
Augustus to date has identified at least 25 possible rare earth ironstone targets from airborne radiometric geophysics, which measures radioactive emissions from the earth’s surface (Figure 2).
Several high quality target areas have been the focus of attention at the prospects Cabbage Tree, and Macs Well, where strong thorium (Th) radiometric and iron oxide signatures exist coupled with possible identification of ironstones through satellite imagery show at least 10kms of possible ironstone formation outcropping at surface (Figure 1).
Figure 1. Macs Well and Cabbage Well REE targets, Aerial Photo (top), Thorium (Th) radiometric anomalies (middle) and SENTINEL-2 high-resolution, multi-spectral imaging (bottom) of Iron oxides.
Figure 2. Distribution of Th radiometrics anomalies showing possible REE ironstone occurrences.
Andrew Reid, Managing Director
“This initial assessment of the rare earth potential on the Augustus tenure highlights the discovery potential for the ground. This multi-layered data combination is a strong indication that ironstones which could host rare earth elements may be present within the Augustus tenure, similar in nature to existing deposits at Dreadnought and Hastings immediately to the north of the Augustus ground.
Ironstones are particularly abundant in the Gascoyne region and the ones that host rare earths are super elevated in concentrations of the two most important rare earth elements Neodymium and Praseodymium used in permanent magnets for EV’s and wind turbines.
Augustus has completed a highly successful IPO in which the Company raised $10m and we are now moving quickly to get on the ground for field checking of these exploration targets.”
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This article includes content from Augustus Minerals Limited, licensed for the purpose of publishing on Investing News Australia. This article does not constitute financial product advice. It is your responsibility to perform proper due diligence before acting upon any information provided here. Please refer to our full disclaimer here.
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Augustus Minerals
Diversification can be key to a profitable mining and exploration strategy. While there's no shortage of companies that have experienced great success by focusing on a single commodity, there's always an element of risk to that approach. There is always the risk that certain commodities will fall in price whilst others rise. Augustus Minerals, a newly listed exploration company on the ASX (AUG) is cognizant of this fact. An exploration company based in Western Australia, Augustus has acquired a 100-percent interest in a land package covering some 3,600 square kilometers in Western Australia's Upper Gascoyne region. Although traditionally known as a source of base metals, gold and uranium, the Gascoyne is rapidly emerging as a prime target for rare earths and lithium discoveries.
As an early mover to the region, Augustus’s vast landholding is highly prospective for lithium, rare earths, copper and gold. Its Ti-Tree project contains 85 kilometers of the Ti Tree and Mingabar shear zones, with extensive, untested, multi-element mineralization and surface anomalies.
The Gascoyne region is a large emerging critical mineral province with several deposits having been discovered in the last few years. These include multiple Ironstone REE discoveries by Dreadnought Resources (ASX:DRE), Hastings Technology's (ASX:HAS) Yangibana Ironstone REE project and Lanthanein Resources' (ASX:LNR) Lyons Ironstone REE project, as well as a large lithium discovery at Delta Lithium's (ASX:DLT) Yinnetharra location.
Directed by a highly experienced management team with extensive knowledge about mining and exploration in the Gascoyne, Augustus's exploration program will focus on more than 50 priority targets already identified by the company. These include potential lithium bearing pegmatites, REE-rich ironstones and shear/porphyry-hosted copper systems. Thus far, the company has completed multiple geophysical surveys and collected more than 15,000 soil samples.
Company Highlights
- Augustus Minerals is an Australian exploration company focused on the highly-prospective Gascoyne region of Western Australia.
- The company has 100 percent ownership of a land package covering 3,600 square kilometers.
- Augustus has identified multiple high-priority lithium, rare earth and copper targets throughout its project, with strong mineralization intersected at multiple locations across multiple commodities.
- Augustus's leadership team has the benefit of significant local knowledge regarding exploration of the Gascoyne province.
Key Asset
Ti Tree Project
Situated in the Shire of Upper Gascoyne and the Shire of Carnarvon, the Ti Tree project displays significant exploration potential for a number of different mineralised styles as well as possibly, multi-commodity discoveries. Spanning a contiguous 3,600 square kilometers, it also has the distinction of being one of the largest properties in the region. Augustus Minerals maintains 100 percent ownership over Ti-Tree, which intersects along the shear of the same name.
The company has identified several high-priority drilling targets along the Ti-Tree and Mingabar structures ready for reverse circulation, diamond or air core drilling.
Highlights:
- Emerging Geological Province: The Gascoyne region displays highly prospective geology and has been the site of multiple rare earth and lithium discoveries in recent years, but has experienced limited historic exploration — making it a prime opportunity for Augustus Minerals.
- Multiple Commodities: Augustus has identified more than 50 significant lithium, rare earth and copper targets. Many of these high-quality targets are ready for drilling.
- Size and Speed: The Ti Tree Project consists of a single coherent block of tenements covering 3,600 square kilometers with 85 kilometers of strike along the Ti-Tree Shear. As an early mover in the region, Augustus was able to gain a considerable advantage in securing this project, into which it has thus far invested $5 million.
- Fertile Geology: Augustus's investment displays the same geology as multiple highly successful neighboring discoveries.
- Mineralization: Current mineral resource targets include:
- 27 rare earth targets across 65 kilometers of strike. All targets display strong thorium radiometric signatures.
- Multiple mafic intrusions with copper-nickel-PGE (platinum group elements) mineralization. The copper resource is both shear-hosted and porphyry-related.
- Elevated lithium stream samples over 10 kilometers of strike length. The target area displays the same geological host rock as the Yinnetharra lithium discovery.
- A narrow, shear vein-hosted gold occurrence with anomalous mineralization displayed in several surrounding areas. The area, known as the Bassit Bore, outcrops at the surface, where visible gold is readily identifiable in hand specimens. Samples collected over 600 meters returned very high gold values.
Management Team
Andrew Ford – General Manager, Exploration
Andrew’s career spans 35 years of exploration and mine development experience in multiple commodities for both majors, including Homestake and Barrick Gold, and junior ASX-listed companies. He has led technical teams throughout Australia, Africa, USA, Europe and Asia, including leading the geology team at the Bawdwin base metals project in Myanmar through the DFS process.
In his most recent role Andrew has led the geology team at Hastings Technology Metals with a focus on resource growth and exploration at the Yangibana Rare Earths Project, where Mineral Resources have now grown to 29.93Mt of TREO.
Brian Rodan - Executive Chairman
Brian Rodan is a fellow of the Australian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy with 45 years’ experience. Previously, he was the managing director and owner of Australian Contract Mining (ACM), a mid-tier mining contracting company that successfully completed $1.5 billion worth of work over a 20-year period.
For 15 years, Rodan held various roles with Eltin Limited (including general manager between 1993 and 1996 and executive director between 1996 and 1999), Australia’s largest full service ASX-listed contract mining company with an annual turnover of $850 million. He was a founding director of Dacian Gold (2013) and Desert Metals (2020) and became the largest shareholder upon listing both companies on the ASX.
Rodan is currently executive chairman of Siren Gold and Iceni Gold Limited, and is currently the largest shareholder in both companies as well as Augustus Minerals.
Graeme Smith - Non-Executive Director
Graeme Smith is an experienced resources sector chief financial officer, company secretary and corporate executive who has worked with mining and exploration companies with operations in Australia (Croesus Mining NL, Genesis Minerals Limited, Jabiru Metals Limited, Breaker Resources NL, Pluton Resources Limited) and overseas (Tanga Resources Limited, Ikwezi Mining Limited) for the past 30 years.
He is the principal of Wembley Corporate Services, which provides company secretarial, CFO and corporate governance services to public companies.
Smith is a fellow of the Australian Society of Certified Practising Accountants, the Institute of Chartered Secretaries and Administrators, and the Governance Institute of Australia. He is currently the company secretary for Alto Metals, Avenira, Renegade Exploration and Enterprise Metals, and was a director of ASX-listed Anglo Australian Resources.
Darren Holden - Non-Executive Director
Dr. Darren Holden is a geologist with 28 years of industry experience in mineral exploration and exploration technologies. He has worked in North America, the Pacific and Australia, where he has been involved in discovery-stage copper, gold, silver, molybdenum and platinum group elements deposits. He specializes in regional to local scale targeting using the integration of geology, geophysics and geochemistry.
Holden is a past vice-president of Geoinformatics/Fractal Geoscience and a former CEO of a publicly listed gold explorer. He currently runs exploration advisory business GeoSpy, and is a co-founder of successful private project generation businesses Marlee Minerals and Odette Geoscience. He is also currently a director Aurumin (ASX:AUN) and chair of OD6 Metals (ASX:OD6), as well as several private companies.
Holden holds a BSc (hons) first class (geology) from The University of Western Australia and a PhD (history) from The University of Notre Dame Australia. He is a fellow of the Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy and a member of the Geological Society of Australia.
Forward Water Technologies
Overview
Forward Water Technologies (TSXV:FWTC) is helping lithium mining companies and other industries reduce their environmental impact through its innovative wastewater treatment technology that enables industrial operations to reduce liquid waste volume by up to 95 percent.
Environmental, social and governance (ESG) ratings continue to be a key business strategy for organizations as they impact public perception and partnership possibilities. For water-intensive industries, such as mining, sustainable wastewater management is critical.
Transformative wastewater technologies are critical for both businesses and the world’s population. In fact, unless sufficient progress is achieved, UNICEF and WHO estimate that 1.6 billion people will be without access to safe drinking water by 2030, and 2.8 billion will be without access to safe sanitation and hygiene. Water treatment technologies can disrupt current trends and improve global access to safe drinking water.
Through its Forward Osmosis (FO) technology, Forward Water is providing an environmentally friendly alternative to traditional wastewater disposal. Traditionally, wastewater disposal requires transporting untreated wastewater for deep well disposal or high-intensity thermal treatment.
Forward Water’s FO system is installed at the client site, and wastewater is treated to reduce waste volume and produce valuable clean water for reuse in the manufacturing process. Then, the significantly reduced volume of wastewater is transported and disposed of, significantly saving on transportation and disposal costs.
The FO technology targets three massive sectors: industrial wastewater, mining and food manufacturing. Forward Water’s unique and patented FO technology achieves high-rate water extraction within a low-energy continuous process. The process reduces waste and allows up to 95 percent water recovery, ready for reuse.
Forward Water’s Li-FO™ technology is ideal for lithium-brine mining operations, allowing mines to “fine tune” brine sources to improve concentration by up to 20 times. This results in improved recovery and makes lower-concentration brines economically viable. Forward Water is currently embarking on an early development testing project to further evaluate and refine the technology’s viability in lithium mining.
In 2023, the company’s wholly owned subsidiary, Forward Water Technologies Inc., licensed specific intellectual property from FUJIFILM Corporation to solidify the protection of its water treatment technology platform.
CleanTech Lithium (AIM:CTL,Frankfurt:T2N,OTC:CTLHF) has contracted FWT to provide advisory services for the support and development of CleanTech Lithium's direct lithium extraction (DLE) process in Chile. The collaboration will use FWT’s industrial forward osmosis system in the hyper-concentrating of CleanTech Lithium's eluate and its conversion into battery-grade lithium carbonate through Conductive Energy's DLE process.
Howie Honeyman, CEO, explained in an interview how the company’s technology can improve lithium mining operations. “A lot of lithium being mined today around the world is coming from underground aquifers that store the lithium brine. The challenge is that the lithium is surrounded by other minerals and salts, requiring chemical ‘tweezers’ to pluck out that lithium. What we can do is, at multiple places in that process, we can concentrate that lithium-containing water stream, which makes it far easier for these miners to handle the volumes they need to extract that lithium.”
An experienced management team with technical expertise leads the company towards further refining and deploying its technology. The team includes experts in materials science, chemistry and engineering. Additional experts in corporate administration and financing round out the leadership team to lead the company toward its goals.
Company Highlights
- Forward Water Technologies has developed a patented wastewater treatment technology that reduces wastewater volume and improves reusability across multiple industries, including mining and food manufacturing.
- The company’s Forward Osmosis (FO) technology disrupts the traditional method of wastewater disposal by reducing the amount of waste that must be transported and disposed of, directly reducing costs.
- The FO technology also improves water reusability by up to 95 percent, reducing the expense of importing water for industrial processes.
- The Forward Water Technologies Li-FO™ process is applicable in the lithium mining sector by improving concentration by up to 20 times, allowing organizations to improve extraction efficiency.
- The company has partnered with a lithium-brine extraction operation to evaluate its Li-FO™ technology.
- Forward Water Technologies is in early negotiations to deliver an FWTC forward osmosis pilot system on-site in Chile to support a customer's lithium extraction process.
- Forward Water Technologies has licensed specific intellectual property from FUJIFILM Corporation to solidify the protection of its water treatment technology platform.
- The company has been contracted by CleanTech Lithium to provide advisory services for the support and development of CleanTech Lithium's direct lithium extraction processes in Chile.
- An experienced management team with a blend of relevant technical expertise leads the company toward refining and marketing its technology.
Key Project
Forward Osmosis Water Treatment
Forward Osmosis is a naturally occurring process in which water is spontaneously drawn across a membrane when one solution is higher in salt concentration than the other. The difference in salinity, known as the osmotic gradient, creates a low-energy water treatment process.
Forward Water Technologies has leveraged the naturally occurring process to innovate its patented, three-step FO technology, enabling a 95 percent wastewater reduction and 95 percent water recovery.
Project Highlights:
- Patented Three-Step Process: Forward Water Technologies FO process achieves low-energy and high-rate water extraction with a unique three-step design:
- Water Extraction: Water is drawn across the FO membrane into a salt draw solution. The combination of the patented draw solution and unique membrane “locks” the draw solution on one side of the membrane, creating a true closed-loop process.
- Water/Salt Separation: Next, a switchable water salt (SWS) achieves water/salt separation as low-grade heat is applied, and it phases from liquid to gas. As the gas leaves the solution, clean water is left behind. The energy necessary for this step is often found in many facilities in the form of waste heat.
- Salt Draw Reconcentration: Finally, as the gas leaves the solution, it is captured within the closed-loop system and is passively cooled, causing it to phase back into liquid form as an SWS. The SWS liquid is collected and recycled back to the front of the membranes in the water extraction step, creating a continuous process.
- Widely Applicable Water Treatment: The low-energy process allows organizations across several industries to improve water reclamation and reduce wastewater by up to 95 percent. Additionally, the process allows for up to 20 times concentration, making the process amenable to lithium-brine extraction and other potential applications.
- Significant Cost Savings: The primary value proposition for the FO process is cost reduction in wastewater transportation and disposal. With the process in place, more water is reclaimed for reuse in manufacturing, which reduces the raw volume of wastewater that must be transported and disposed of.
Management Team
Howie Honeyman - Chief Executive Officer and President
Dr. Howie Honeyman has 20 years of experience commercializing new technologies at Xerox, Cabot, E Ink, Natrix Separations and as former CTO of GreenCentre Canada. Honeyman commercialized high-capacity, high-throughput membranes for bioprocessing as SVP of Natrix Separations, which has since been acquired by Millipore-Sigma. Since 2015, Honeyman has been leading Forward Water to become a premier wastewater treatment solution. Honeyman is also an inventor of record on over 50 US patents and holds a PhD in chemistry from the University of Toronto.
Michael Willetts - Chief Financial Officer
Michael Willetts has over 25 years in financial leadership roles primarily in manufacturing, from large multinational businesses to startups, both public and private. He previously worked as an engineer in the automotive industry before entering into finance at Ford Motor Company. Willets went on to progressively larger finance roles in several international automotive suppliers (Textron, GKN, DSM) and Canadian manufacturers (Armtec, Stronach International, AirBoss of America). Willetts is currently providing fractional CFO services through WD Numeric Corporate Services in the manufacturing, SaaS and cannabis industries. Willetts graduated with a BASc, BComm and MBA from the University of Windsor.
Wayne Maddever - Chief Operating Officer
Dr. Wayne Maddever received his Ph.D. in materials science engineering from the University of Toronto. Since 1985, he has held senior executive management positions with technically based businesses in start-up, turnaround or acquisition situations where his skills in change management have brought considerable success in the commercialization of new technologies. His experience in both private and public companies, domestically and internationally, spans a broad variety of industries, including bio and advanced materials, precision manufacturing, recycling, waste-to-energy and medical devices. He holds a number of patents in several fields. He is a fellow of the Canadian Academy of Engineering. In addition to his duties as COO of Forward Water, he is currently portfolio manager at Bioindustrial Innovation Canada, one of the major shareholders of Forward Water.
Grant Thornley - VP Engineering Solution Sales
Grant Thornley is a business strategist with more than 25 years of experience. He has developed and grown international water/wastewater markets through innovative growth hacking techniques and processes, synergized with product development and positioning, data analytics and acceleration of go-to-market strategies through alliances and partnerships. Having expertise in chemical, mechanical and biological treatment processes as well as designing hundreds of municipal and industrial applications, Thornley brings a knowledge-to-action approach to helping clients solve problems and realize new opportunities in water reuse, energy conservation and CO2 reduction.
Leonard Seed - Director of Engineering & Operations
Leonard Seed has over 18 years of experience developing and commercializing new water and wastewater treatment technologies, primarily in a start-up environment. Seed is named as an inventor on over seven patents and has authored several publications. Seed is a professional engineer and has an MSc in environmental engineering from the University of Guelph. Leonard holds inventorship on seven US patents and is an instructor at Mohawk College teaching aspects of water treatment technologies and leading research efforts on forward osmosis.
Philip Jessop - Executive Research Director
Dr. Philip Jessop is a professor and Canada Research Chair of Green Chemistry at the Department of Chemistry, Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario. He also serves as the technical director of GreenCentre Canada and executive research director at Forward Water Technologies. After his Ph.D. (British Columbia, 1991) and a postdoctoral appointment (Toronto, 1992), he became a contract researcher in Japan working for R. Noyori (Nobel Prize 2001). As a professor at the University of California-Davis (1996-2003) and since then at Queen’s, he has studied green solvents and the chemistry of carbon dioxide. Distinctions include the NSERC Polanyi Award (2008), Killam Research Fellowship (2010), Canadian Green Chemistry & Engineering Award (2012), Eni Award (2013), Fellowship in the Royal Society of Canada (2013), a Canada Research Chair Tier 1 (2013 to 2020), and the NSERC Brockhouse Prize (2019). He serves as chair of the editorial board for the journal Green Chemistry, has chaired three international conferences, and helped create GreenCentre Canada, a national center of excellence for the commercialization of green chemistry technologies. Forward Water is a spin-off company based on Dr. Jessop’s switchable solvents.
Quarterly Activities Report for the Period Ended 31 March 2024
Highlights
Solonópole Project, Ceará, Brazil
- Anomalous lithium values above 100 ppm (and up to 631 ppm) found in 383 soil samples within existing and new target areas.
- Integration and interpretation of these soil sample results with data from geophysics, geological mapping (138 line-km), trenching and RC drilling (~2,000m) further enhance prospectivity of existing and new targets.
- Combined datasets confirmed several swarms of pegmatite bodies striking in a NE-SW and E-W directions and identified new high priority areas.
- Nira interpreted to be the most prospective new target, with 180 soil samples of >100 ppm Li and as high as 524 ppm Li covering an area of at least 1km2.
- Nira also features 17 pegmatite outcrops with average widths of up to 30 meters and strike lengths from 200m to 600m.
- Planning for the next follow-up drilling campaign is underway.
Napperby Project, Northern Territory, Australia
- Oceana’s Napperby Project covers some of Arunta Province’s hottest granites plutons, the Wangala Granite (uranium) and Ennugan Mountains Granite (uranium/thorium).
- Both granite plutons show outstanding uranium/thorium ratios and are almost fully encapsulated within Napperby’s EL32836 and ELA32841.
- Follow-up exploration activities will target uranium and Rare Earth Elements (REEs) in parallel with Lithium-Caesium-Tantalum (LCT) pegmatites.
Corporate
- Experienced geologist and mining executive, Aidan Platel, appointed as non- executive director.
- Brazilian-based geologist, Mike Sousa, appointed as Exploration Manager and Competent Person.
- The Company remains well-funded with cash at 31 March of ~$2.67m.
OPERATIONS
Solonópole Project, Ceará State, Brazil
The Solonópole Project area is located in the state of Ceará, north-eastern Brazil and consists of ten (10) exploration permits covering approximately 124km2 (Figure 1), owned by Oceana’s subsidiary Ceará Litio. The project is approximately three to four hours by road from the state capital Fortaleza and deep-water port of Pecém, and is well serviced by sealed highways and high voltage electricity.
Figure 1: Solonópole Project permits and targets drilled in May – June 2023 (red dots)
Large-Scale Soil Sampling and Geological Mapping at Solonópole Lithium Project
The large-scale infill soil sampling program that commenced in March 2023 continued over the project area (Figure 2). The optimized sampling grids are along 200m spaced lines with 25m sampling stations, aligned north south to cut across all typical pegmatite strike directions in this area.
As at 31 March 2024, over 10,300 soil samples had been collected from Solonópole and 8,741 soil samples had been analysed by X-Ray Fluorescence (XRF) for Lithium-Caesium-Tantalum (LCT) pathfinders, of which 1,908 soil samples have lab results validated by Oceana´s internal QA/QC. Anomalous lithium values above 100 ppm and up to 631 ppm were found in 383 soil samples within existing and new target areas.
Click here for the full ASX Release
This article includes content from Oceana Lithium, licensed for the purpose of publishing on Investing News Australia. This article does not constitute financial product advice. It is your responsibility to perform proper due diligence before acting upon any information provided here. Please refer to our full disclaimer here.
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