Talga Gold (ASX: TLG) has secured options to buy Teck Resource’s Swedish assets including iron, graphite and iron oxide copper gold (IOCG)projects defined by previous diamond core drilling.
The iron deposit has an inferred resource of 44.1 million tonnes at 30.9% iron while the graphite deposit has an inferred resource of 3.6 million tonnes at 23% graphite.
Multiple IOCG drill-ready targets have also been identified and are awaiting first pass or follow-up drill testing.
The projects are located in an established mining province in northern Sweden with nearby infrastructure including grid power, all weather sealed roads and railways servicing multiple ports.
Access is also available to extensive historic drilling, geochemical and geophysical databases.
Talga paid US$45,000 for the options over the 11 exploration permits covering 230 square kilometres and has until 30 June 2012 to buy TCL Sweden – Teck’s Swedish subsidiary holding the assets – for US$433,500 and a 1% net smelter royalty.
The most advanced iron project, Masugnybsyn, contains the Junosuando deposit, a 2800 metre long by up to 100 metre wide zone of skarn magnetite alteration/mineralisation.
At Junosuando, 18 diamond drill holes for 3,284.25 metres were used to define the inferred resource and Talga plans to carry out an initial program of confirmation and infill drilling to upgrade the resource here and recover samples for metallurgical testwork.
The most advanced graphite deposit is Nunasvaara where a 700 metre long graphite deposit up to 50 metres wide was defined following completion of 21 diamond drill holes, 12 trenches and bulk sampling during 1970-1982.
The high grade of this deposit has resulted in most historical work being focussed on assessing the graphite as fuel for iron ore smelters and domestic heating rather than a marketable graphite product.
Talga had A$3.23 million in cash at the end of the December 2011 quarter and is fully funded for the drilling necessary to upgrade Junosuando and Nunasvaara while continuing exploration of its Western Australia gold projects.