Forte Energy (ASX, AIM: FTE) has reported a maiden high-grade JORC Code compliant mineral resource estimate for its 100%-owned Bir En Nar Uranium Project, located in Mauritania, West Africa.
The resource, which was independently estimated and verified by Coffey Mining Pty Ltd, comprises an Indicated and Inferred Resource of 1.33Mt grading 704ppm U3O8 for 2 million pounds of contained U3O8 (using a 100ppm U3O8 cut-off).
The Indicated Resource is 0.55Mt @ 886pm U3O8 for 1.07Mlbs of contained U3O8 and the Inferred Resource is 0.78Mt @ 575pm U3O8 for 0.99Mlbs of contained U3O8.
The Resource follows the 5,575m diamond and Reverse Circulation (RC) drilling programme completed earlier this year.
This is the company’s first JORC resource in Mauritania and complements the initial JORC resource inventory of 17.7Mt @ 296ppm U3O8 (11.6 million pounds of contained U3O8) announced last year for its Firawa Uranium Project in the Republic of Guinea.
Key features of the Bir En Nar resource are its exceptional grade and the fact that it remains open in several areas, with potential to expand relatively quickly with additional drilling.
Mark Reilly, Managing Director, said “Bir En Nar is a high grade deposit which remains open at depth in several areas, including evidence for another mineralised zone between the Northern and the Southern Zones."
"The next drilling campaign will target these areas as well as improve the data from the RC holes which could not be incorporated in this initial resource statement."
“Forte Energy considers this to be a base number for the mineral resource. The independent consultant has not used the results from the gamma logging carried out in conjunction with the 2007 RC drilling programme."
Forte Energy is planning further work at Bir En Nar including further drilling to verify the data which we believe will increase both the tonnage and the grade of the deposit.
“Bir En Nar has provided us with a good platform as we continue our strategy to build up several high grade resources in our Mauritania portfolio,” Reilly added.
“We look forward to the RC drilling results from our second priority target, Bir Moghrein, later this Quarter and to recommencing drilling at Bir En Nar to lay the foundations for our next JORC resource statement.”
The mineralisation remains open down dip in many areas; and there is evidence for another mineralised zone to the southwest of the main zones which have currently been modelled.
However, the quantity of the drill hole data was not sufficient to allow inclusion of this zone in the Resource estimate.
Forte Energy and Areva (Euronext: CEI) have agreed to establish a joint venture to develop the company's Mauritanian assets if a minimum 60-80 million pounds of JORC code compliant inferred uranium resources are established within the next two years.