NeoTerra Group PLC is trading higher on achieving 85% gallium extraction in initial hydrometallurgical testing at its Monte Muambe Project in Mozambique, providing further support for the development of a potential gallium recovery flowsheet.
The African critical minerals developer said acid leaching tests carried out by SGS Lakefield recovered 85% of the gallium into the leachate while showing good selectivity against silica.
Separate ore-sorting work by Comex also identified a potential route to pre-concentrate gallium using X-Ray Transmission (XRT) technology.
NeoTerra shares were up 10.3% at 2.15p in early London trading following the announcement, compared with Wednesday’s close of 1.95p.
Metallurgical testing supports recovery pathway
Comex tested both Short-Wave Infra-Red and XRT technologies on gallium-bearing feldspar, with XRT successfully separating the feldspar hosting the gallium from other minerals.
The feldspar represents around 30% of the rock mass, indicating potential for ore sorting to reduce the volume of material requiring downstream processing.
NeoTerra said the results supported its assumptions around possible pre-concentration and extraction methods, although further work will be required before the commercial viability of gallium recovery can be determined.
Further ore-sorting tests will quantify gallium upgrading using XRT and SWIR sensors, while X-Ray Fluorescence technology will also be assessed.
Hydrometallurgical work will focus on optimising leaching conditions and establishing how gallium can be recovered from the resulting leachate.
Monte Muambe resource growth in focus
Once sufficient confidence has been established in the recovery process, NeoTerra plans additional drilling aimed at materially expanding Monte Muambe’s current gallium resource of 11.73 million tonnes at 54.7 g/t Ga2O3 to at least 50 million tonnes.
The broader Monte Muambe project also hosts JORC resources of 13.6 million tonnes at 2.42% TREO and 3.48 million tonnes at 20.6% CaF2.
The project is held under a 25-year mining licence and is being
