Patagonia Lithium Ltd (ASX:PL3) shares have rose 5.7% intra-day to 18 cents after receiving high-grade lithium results from a sampling program at its Formentera and Cilon projects in the lithium triangle of Argentina.
28 samples were submitted to SGS Argentina with two brine samples assayed at 1,008ppm and 1,122ppm.
Patagonia executive director Phil Thomas (right) with sample bottles at SGS Argentina.
10 of those 19 brine samples exceeded 75ppm, including 238ppm and 467ppm in the brines at hole 4 and 18 respectively.
Patagonia executive director Phil Thomas said: “The board is delighted with these sampling results.
“The extreme high levels of lithium in the brines from surface sampling demonstrate that there are high concentrations of lithium across a wide area near the surface on the concessions.”
Significantly, the highest-grade lithium samples also had elevated values of boron that is related to the presence of lithium.
Patagonia has observed that extremely low ratios of magnesium-to-lithium were recorded that makes extraction processing more efficient.
The company will take a twenty-litre sample from hole 16 for analysis at the Ekosolve™ facility at the University of Melbourne to determine the recovery and grade of lithium chloride.
Geophysics study for drill targeting
An 18-kilometre MT geophysics study is currently underway to determine the resistivity, depth and location of aquifers on both concessions.
Once the MT data is collated and interpreted, Patagonia will have high confidence of where the drilling targets will intersect aquifers containing conductive fluids which may be containing lithium.
The geophysics will outline the extent and depth of the low-resistivity lithologies (aquifers) which appear to be concentrated in areas close to the surface.