Orion Minerals Ltd (ASX:ORN) (JSE: ORN) has compared diamond drill results from its Disawell prospects in South Africa to Independence Group NL’s (ASX-IGO) Nova-Bollinger deposit on Western Australia’s Fraser Range.
The results are from the first nickel-copper target, Rok Optel 2, on the Namaqua and Disawell mineral rights of the Jacomynspan project within the Areachap Belt.
Orion reported that the drill hole intersected a thick succession of sulphide-bearing mafic to ultramafic intrusive rocks.
“Importantly, injected veinlets of massive sulphide — locally greater than 90% over 2-15 centimetres of pyrrhotite, chalcopyrite and pentlandite mineralogy — confirm the presence of magmatic nickel-copper sulphide mineralisation.”
‘Fundamentally similar’ to Nova-Bollinger
Managing director and CEO Errol Smart said: "The first intersection at Rok Optel 2 has confirmed our expectation that the Jacomynspan intrusive complex is fundamentally similar to what we saw in the Fraser Range.
“We have now demonstrated that geological conditions exist for accumulation of large intrusive massive sulphide bodies similar to Nova-Bollinger and that our modern exploration techniques will facilitate discovery of these massive sulphides.”
Smart told Proactive Investors the company had made an important step forward at Jacomynspan, which had exceeded its expectations.
The chief executive said the company expected to submit all drill samples from the first drill hole to the Johannesburg laboratories of global independent laboratory ALS Ltd (ASX: ALQ) in the next two days.
He said he expected the results would be available in two to three weeks.
Nova-Bollinger’s massive sulphide ore body features a 13.1 million tonne mineral resource grading 2% nickel and 0.8% copper.
Independence Group will hold a 8.23% stake in Orion and has rights to pick up or form a potential joint venture for any of the company’s nickel projects on the Areachap Belt.
The strategic partners have a joint venture for their Fraser Range nickel-copper project in WA.
Smart told Proactive Investors Orion believed nickel had an outstanding outlook, expecting demand for nickel in batteries would improve demand in the medium term.
He said the company was interested in the potential for creating nickel sulfate from nickel sulphides and was currently evaluating patents from across the world, including one Independence Group has been collaborating with a partner to progress.
Range-like comparison
Orion’s experienced team includes staffers with extensive experience on the range who the company said could “draw meaningful comparisons between the two terranes, which have similar ages, tectonic settings and metamorphic overprints”.
The company reported the intersections seen at Namaqua and Disawell “provide strong geological proof of concept for Orion’s expectation that the Jacomynspan group of intrusions has good potential to host high-grade massive sulphide mineralisation similar to the Nova-Bollinger deposit”.
Geology of the Areachap Belt around Orion’s properties.
The company reported the geotectonic setting and age of Jacomynspan Namaqua-Natal intrusions were directly comparable to those found in the range.
“The similarity in geological terranes between Areachap and Fraser Range is further underscored by Independence Group’s recent announcement of their discovery of what appears to be a Prieska-style volcanogenic massive sulphide at Andromeda in the Fraser Range,” Smart said.
Orion’s CEO told Proactive Investors the injected massive sulphides the company were an important discovery and people would begin to pay attention to the quality of the company’s asset as the market conditions improved.
Smart said the company aimed to bring its close-together project’s to people’s attention while delivering high-quality results and leapfrogging other explorers by exploring its projects of known mineralisation with modern technologies and then seeing the benefits.
READ: Orion Minerals continues to progress drilling at Prieska Zinc-Copper Project
Orion shared its quarterly activities report with the market earlier today, bringing in $23 million in capital raisings during the June financial quarter while also updating its mineral resource for its flagship Prieska Zinc-Copper Project in South Africa to 29.5 million tonnes.
The company is advancing a definitive feasibility study for the project and aims to complete it this year.
It hopes to enter production next year.
The company’s cash position is $19 million.