Grid Metals

Focused on High-Value Palladium Deposits in Canada

This Grid Metals profile is part of a paid investor education campaign.*

Overview

Grid Metals Corp (TSXV:GRDM) is a Canadian exploration company  with key projects in Ontario and Manitoba. Grid Metals Corp is currently focused on the East Bull Lake palladium property located 80 km west  of Sudbury, Ontario.  Grid is targeting palladium dominant mineralization at East Bull. Infrastructure at East Bull is excellent as it road accessible off the TransCanada Highway. Sudbury is a world class mining hub for mining and smelting of nickel, copper and platinum-group metals (PGM).

Grid Metals first acquired and  began exploring the East Bull Lake property in 1998. The property covers the ~22km x ~4km layered East Bull Lake Intrusion.  At East Bull significant exploration   was undertaken   between 1998 and 2002 and 2008 and 2012  including airborne surveys, geological mapping and sampling and drilling. Overall highly anomalous palladium- platinum (PGM) values are present across the property. With the increase in the price of palladium  due to its globally strategic use in autocatalysts for emissions reduction  Grid has resumed its exploration focus at East Bull.   The Company is now focusing on a new geological model for deposit formation based on feeder zones associated with the major structures (faults)  which may serve as traps for palladium bearing sulfides to   accumulate.  The Company  recently added Dr. Dave Peck ( former VP Exploration of North American Palladium ) to lead business development and  exploration.

Grid Metals Corp also owns the mineral rights to the pre-feasibility stage Makwa-Mayville Ni-Cu-PGE-Cobalt project located near Winnipeg, Manitoba. The project consists of two  NI 43-101 open pit  resources, the nickel-dominant Makwa deposit and the copper-dominant Mayville property located  only 40 kilometers away. A NI 43-101 compliant preliminary economic assessment (PEA) was completed on the property in April 2014 outlining the economics   for a blast and haul operation with ore from the two deposits   processed  at the Mayville site in order to produce both copper concentrate and nickel concentrate.

Grid Metals’ Company Highlights

• Grid is one of the few juniors with significant commodity exposure to both nickel and palladium which are crucial metals for the automotive industry.
• Focused on the 100-percent owned* East Bull Lake  Palladium  property located in Sudbury, Ontario ( *subject to underlying Net Smelter Royalties).
• A  2020 a geophysical survey covering a significant part of the property has generated new drill targets.
• Exploration team led by Dave Peck, former VP of Exploration with North American Palladium who previously led nickel exploration globally for Anglo American Exploration group.
• Development-stage Makwa-Mayville project provides exposure to nickel, copper, and PGMs with over $2.5 billion in  in situ resources according to a 2014 PEA.
• Makwa-Mayville project  includes two open pit resources,  the nickel-dominant Makwa deposit  and the copper-dominant Mayville deposit.

Grid Metals’ East Bull Lake Palladium Property

Grid Metals’ wholly-owned East Bull Lake palladium property covers approximately 80 percent of the East Bull Lake intrusion in northeastern Ontario. The property is easily accessible from the city of Sudbury, which is 80 kilometers away via the TransCanada Highway and  an all-weather provincial road. Sudbury is a world class mining centre that has several producing nickel-copper-PG M mines and two smelters.

The East Bull  intrusion is the type example of a series of palladium-rich mafic complexes that occur in the greater Sudbury region.  These bodies formed during a major, global-scale episode of mafic and ultramafic magmatic activity that produced significant palladium, copper-nickel sulfide and chromite deposits in Canada, Scandinavia, Russia and Brazil approximately 2.5 billion years ago.  The EBL intrusion shares many geological and geophysical characteristics with the older Lac des Iles (LDI) complex in northwestern Ontario – host to Canada’s only primary palladium mine with a global resource of ~ 10 million ounces.

Exploration History

The East Bull Lake property was first drilled by Silcross Copper Mines in 1952 north of the Parisien Lake area.     The  best assay values reported were  1.65 percent copper and 8.81 percent nickel. Various  exploration and mining companies including Inco Exploration,  WMC International Ltd., and Freewest Resources continued to explore the area through the 1990s.  From 1982 to 1989 Atomic Energy Canada completed mapping, stripping and ground and airborne geophysics and drilled 4 holes to assess EBLI as a potential radioactive waste storage site.  The first PGM focused exploration at East Bull  occurred from 1987 to 1990.  East Bull was also studied extensively  as part of a mineral potential study by Laurentian University and the Ontario Geological survey  between 1989 and 1995.

Grid Metals  Acquires Property – 1998 

Grid acquired the property in 1998 under option from prospectors and began exploration. The first area  drilled was  the Moon Lake area. The drilling returned anomalous palladium-platinum- gold ( 3E) values along with copper values. In 2000 Grid entered into an Option and Joint Venture Agreement funded by  Falconbridge Limited.  Extensive geological mapping, sampling linecutting, trenching and airborne geophysics was completed over large areas of the intrusion over two field seasons in 2000 and 2001. Extensive “contact style” mineralization was observed along both the north and south margins of the west lobe and the south margin of the east lobe of the East Bull Lake Intrusion. Grid optioned the property to Western Areas Ltd (an Australian nickel producer)  who completed geophysics and some drilling between 2008 and 2012 when the option was terminated.   A key package of claims was acquired by Grid in 2019 which covered ~ 2 km along strike of the Parisien Lake Zone. Previous drilling in the PLDZ had intersected a broad zone of anomalous mineralization over 600 meters of strike length in an area of extensive surface mineralization. Meter scale values in excess of 2 g/t Pd were obtained.

Drilling

Between 1999 and 2002 Grid Metals   drilled in several locations targeting “ contact style” mineralization which occurs along the margins of the intrusion.  The Moon Lake area, Valhalla area, ( now owned by Canadian Palladium ) Parisien Lake area,  Goulding Lake area and South Rim areas have been targeted.  In all cases anomalous palladium values were obtained in drilling.

New Team – New Geological Model and 2020 Exploration

In 2020 Grid Metals announced that Dr. Dave Peck Ph.D. P.Geo was joining the Company as head of business development and exploration.  Dr. Peck left North American Palladium (PDL) after it was acquired in a takeover by Impala Platinum for C$ 1 billion in December 2019.  The key asset acquired was the producing Lac des Isle (LDI)  palladium mine near Thunder Bay. At PDL, Dr. Peck headed up exploration and resource expansion as VP Exploration.

Dr Peck has noted strong similarities between the rocks at Lac des Isle and East Bull Lake and Grid is now applying the Lac des Isle model ( ie  a structurally controlled “feeder style” type deposit ) to East Bull.

Using existing airborne data, geology and known surface mineralization several areas were targeted for surveying using a magnetotelluric ( MT) survey  which was used successfully at Lac des Isles to target areas of concentration of palladium bearing sulfides.  When utilized successfully MT can define  structure and outline target  areas of disseminated sulfides at great depth. The Company initially selected the Parisien Lake area and  the South Rim of the east lobe  for MT surveying. Two scout lines across the west lobe of the intrusion were also surveyed.

The MT surveys have identified a number of priority drill targets including the large PL-4 anomaly which occurs at a major structural intersection between the two lobes of the East Bull Intrusion. Drilling of the first set of  target anomalies  will provide proof of concept that the MT survey is successfully identifying  palladium bearing sulfide mineralization.

Makwa-Mayville project

Grid Metals’ Makwa-Mayville project is located approximately 145 km southeast of  Winnipeg, Manitoba in the Bird River Greenstone Belt. The project comprises two claim blocks covering the north limb ( Mayville ) and south limb ( Makwa) of the Bird River Sill.

The Mayville property hosts the Mayville Copper Nickel Deposit and the Makwa Property hosts the nickel dominant Makwa Nickel Deposit.  Both deposits outcrop and   additional exploration potential exists in the large belt.

The resource calculation included with  the 2014 PEA (RPA Inc.) includes:

• 7.2 Mt at Makwa in the indicated category, grading 0.61 percent nickel, 0.13 percent copper, 0.10 g/t platinum, 0.36 g/t palladium and 0.01 percent copper
• 26.6 Mt at Mayville in the indicated category, grading  0.18 percent nickel, 0.44 percent copper, 0.05 g/t platinum, 0.14 g/t palladium and 0.05 g/t gold.
• 0.7 Mt in the inferred category at Makwa, including 0.27 percent nickel, 0.08 percent copper, 0.05 g/t platinum, 0.14 g/t palladium and 0.02 percent copper
• 5.2 Mt in the inferred category at Mayville, including 0.19 percent nickel, 0.48 percent copper, 0.06 g/t platinum, 0.15 g/t palladium and 0.04 g/t gold.
• Note: mineral resources that are not mineral reserves do not have demonstrated economic viability. ( see Company website for additional information and disclaimers)

Moving forward, Grid Metals intends to update the economic parameters and costs at the Makwa-Mayville project in order to incorporate them into an updated PEA using nickel prices in the US$8 lb range. Additional exploration is also planned to increase resources and improve project economics.

Mayville PGE Zone 

In addition to the Makwa-Mayville prospect, Grid Metals is also developing the Mayville PGE zone, located approximately 1 kilometer southwest of the Mayville deposit. The zone is ultramafic hosted   palladium and platinum mineralization with low copper and nickel values as well. The host ultramafic package strikes for   several kilometers and only part of the stratigraphy has been drill tested.

Grid Metals’ Management Team

Robin Dunbar–President, CEO and Director

Mr. Dunbar is President and CEO of Grid. Metals Corp and is based in Toronto. He is also a director of McEwen Mining Inc. which is dual-listed on the NYSE and TSX. He is a former director of Australian nickel producer Western Areas Ltd. Mr. Dunbar holds an M.B.A. from Dalhousie University.

Dr. Dave Peck–VP Exploration and Business Development Qualified Person

Dave has joined Grid Metals in a consulting capacity to oversee business development and exploration. He has extensive experience in the mineral exploration and mining industry most recently as Vice President Exploration for North American Palladium Ltd. prior to its acquisition by Impala Platinum. From 2003-2009 he was Global Nickel Commodity Leader for Anglo American plc ‘s Exploration Division. Dave has a PhD. in Geology from Melbourne University Victoria Australia.

Rodger Roden–CFO

Mr. Roden is a Chartered Accountant with more than 25 years of industry experience. He has worked as Vice President of Finance/Chief Financial Officer with public and private companies in a broad range of industries. His experience includes all aspects of corporate finance, mergers, and acquisitions, IT implementations, restructuring, turn-around work, tax, and business systems and processes analyses/implementation. Currently, Mr. Roden provides CFO services to several publicly traded pre-production mining companies.

Carey Galeschuk–Geologist

Mr. Galeschuk is a registered professional geoscientist in Manitoba and Ontario and is responsible for the company’s exploration efforts in Manitoba which include the Mayville and the Makwa Projects. He has over 26 years in mineral exploration across Canada working for junior and senior exploration companies in a variety of commodities which includes rare metals, base metals, gold, nickel and PGM’s.

Tom Meredith–Director

Mr. Meredith has 30 years of experience in the junior mining industry and is the Chairman of West Red Lake Gold Mines. Previously he was the President & CEO of Lexam VG Gold from 1995 to December 2011 where he led the development of four gold projects in Timmins, Canada. During the early 1990’s he served as the Vice President of Operations for Northfield Metals Inc. where he was responsible for initiating production at the Cheminis Gold Mine near Kirkland Lake, Ontario.

Ted Munden–Director

Mr. Munden has been a director since 1999. He is a professional geological engineer with an MBA and is a co-founder of a private investment company that has provided and/or arranged funding and managerial assistance to a portfolio of energy, mining, and technology software companies. Mr. Munden has held positions in the energy, mining, manufacturing and technology industries for more than 35 years and is currently focused on the development and financing of oil and gas leasing and drilling projects in Texas. Mr. Munden is also a director of Aquila Resources Inc. (TSX:AQA).

Disclaimer: This profile is sponsored by Grid Metals Corp (TSXV:GRDM). This profile provides information which was sourced by the Investing News Network (INN) and approved by Grid Metals Corp, in order to help investors learn more about the company. Grid Metals Corp is a client of INN. The company’s campaign fees pay for INN to create and update this profile.

INN does not provide investment advice and the information on this profile should not be considered a recommendation to buy or sell any security. INN does not endorse or recommend the business, products, services or securities of any company profiled.

The information contained here is for information purposes only and is not to be construed as an offer or solicitation for the sale or purchase of securities. Readers should conduct their own research for all information publicly available concerning the company. Prior to making any investment decision, it is recommended that readers consult directly with Grid Metals Corp and seek advice from a qualified investment advisor.