Stavely Minerals Ltd (ASX:SVY) will soon commence a scoping study at the Thursday’s Gossan copper deposit, part of its Stavely Copper-Gold Project in Western Victoria, after receiving encouraging results from a conceptual study.
The chalcocite-enriched supergene blanket at Thursday’s Gossan hosts 110,000 tonnes of copper in 28 million tonnes of inferred resources averaging 0.4% copper.
The key elements of the conceptual study included a mining and processing rate of about 2 million tonnes per annum for eight years at an average feed grade of 0.5% copper.
Although the conceptual study points towards an "encouraging" net present value and internal rate of return, the projected returns could be boosted with an increase in the size of the mineral resource.
As recent drilling has identified chalcocite copper mineralisation outside the current mineral resource boundary.
A continuous surface miner may also reduce forecast mining and milling costs.
While beneficiating the mineralisation from un-mineralised clays before flotation of the sulphide concentrate could reduce processing costs.
These will be evaluated in the scoping study and would likely see an increase in the NPV and IRR.
The Thursday’s Gossan copper deposit is transected by a regional rail line, which connects it directly to the Victorian port of Portland, and has the benefit of proximity to other well-developed road access and power infrastructure.
Last month, Stavely received offers totalling in excess of $1 million of co-funding for exploration programs under the Victorian Government’s TARGET exploration initiative.
Proactive Investors Australia is the market leader in producing news, articles and research reports on ASX emerging companies with distribution in Australia, UK, North America and Hong Kong / China.