Thursday, October 25, 2012

Blackheath Panasqueira Purchase

http://www.marketwire.com/press-release/Primary-Metals-Announces-NI-43-101-Resource-Estimates-for-Panasqueira-Tungsten-Mine-601120.htm

2006 NI 43-101
The estimate resulted in total mineral resources of 4,649,000 tonnes containing 1,180,408 MTU's of tungsten trioxide. (One MTU equals 1 metric tonne unit or 10 kilograms of WO3 - tungsten trioxide. The mean quoted European price for tungsten is currently US$255 per MTU of WO3) The total included Proven and Probable Reserves of 1,391,000 tonnes at a grade of 0.233% WO3 (containing 324,408 MTU's of tungsten trioxide) and additional Indicated Resources of 3,258,000 tonnes at a grade of 0.263% WO3 (containing a further 856,000 MTU's of tungsten trioxide). In addition, there were a further 1,610,000 tonnes at a grade of 0.224% WO3 (containing 360,000 MTU's of tungsten trioxide) in the Inferred Resource category.

"At current mining rates, these reserves and indicated resources will be sufficient for the next eight years. We are particularly encouraged that these reserves and indicated resources are located above our existing Levels 2 and 3 and may be readily accessed by lateral mine development. There appears to be no immediate need for early development of the new Level 4 in the mine in order to access inferred resources. Recent exploration and development work has also been very encouraging and indicates the continuation of further mineralization in our mine Level 4, and also in the Panasqueira Deep area, accessible from Level 2, which should add to future resource estimates," commented Lewis Black, Chairman of the Company. "Tests are also underway to examine the possibility of re-treatment of some of our historic tailings material which, if successful, would further add to the long term potential of our operations."

Tungsten.—Production from the Panasqueira tungsten mine was 799 t in concentrate (W content) in 2010 compared with 823 t in 2009, which was a decrease of almost 3%. The Panasqueira Mine was operated by Sojitz and continued to be one of the EU’s leading producers of tungsten concentrates with a capacity to produce 1,400 t/yr of tungsten oxide (WO3) concentrate. According to Sojitz, the mine had proven and probable reserves of 1.4 Mt at a grade of 0.233% WO3, additional indicated resources of 3.3 Mt at a grade of 0.263% WO3, and inferred resources of 1.6 Mt at a grade of 0.224% WO3. The main end-use application for tungsten was in the manufacture of cemented carbides (60%), steel and alloys (21%), electrical and electronics products (11%), and catalysts and pigments (8%) (Direcção Geral de Energia e Geologia, 2011; MBendi Information Services (Pty) Ltd., 2011d).


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