Impact Minerals

Maiden Mineral Resource Estimate Of 880,000 Tonnes Of Contained Alumina At The Lake Hope High Purity Alumina (HPA) Project, WA

Impact Minerals Limited (ASX:IPT) is pleased to announce a significant, substantial and high-grade maiden Mineral Resource Estimate (MRE) for its flagship Lake Hope High Purity Alumina (HPA) Project located about 500 km east of Perth in Western Australia. Impact has the right to earn an 80% interest in Playa One Pty Ltd, owner of the Lake Hope Project, via an incorporated joint venture (Figure 1 and ASX Release 21st March 2023).


  • A maiden mineral resource of 3.5 million tonnes at 25.1% alumina (Al2O3) for a contained 880,000 tonnes of alumina has been defined at the Lake Hope HPA Project in WA.
  • 88% of the resource, or about 775,000 tonnes of alumina, is in the higher confidence Indicated Resource category.
  • Impact aims to bring Lake Hope into production to deliver high-margin end-products into a rapidly expanding global market with current prices for benchmark 4N HPA (99.99% Al2O3) and related products of about US$20,000 per tonne.
  • The unique geological properties of the Lake Hope deposit will allow for a shallow, very low-cost, free-digging operation only one to two metres deep and with offsite metallurgical processing at an established industrial site.
  • Previous bench-scale metallurgical test work has produced HPA from representative lake clays via a disruptive sulphuric acid hydrometallurgical process likely to be cost- competitive with other producers and developers in Australia and globally.
  • The proposed operation will have a small environmental footprint and low carbon emissions.
  • Impact will continue to focus its immediate activities on completing the Scoping Study, lodgement of a Mining Lease Application in Q3 2023 and the continuation of a Pre-Feasibility Study, which includes more comprehensive metallurgical test work and baseline environmental studies.
  • An initial heritage survey with the Ngadju First Nations group will commence in late June-early July.
Impact Minerals’ Managing Director, Dr Mike Jones, said, “This large and high-grade alumina resource will underpin our quest to become one of the world’s lowest-cost producers of High Purity Alumina over the next few years. This unique resource could provide multi-decade delivery of a mineral product recently added to Australia’s Critical Mineral list.

The resource allows us to now finish our Scoping Study which will demonstrate the economics of the project and be a catalyst for Impact to lodge a Mining Lease Application in the next Quarter. The Pre- Feasibility Study also continues apace with metallurgical test work, environmental baseline studies in progress, and a heritage survey with the Ngadju First Nations group to be completed in July. We continue our rapid journey to low-cost production in the quickly expanding, high-margin HPA business where current benchmark prices for 99.99% purity alumina or so-called 4N HPA, are currently in the region of US$20,000 per tonne”.

The Mineral Resource, 88% of which is in the higher confidence category of Indicated Resources, lies within a unique deposit of high-grade alumina (aluminium oxide, Al2O3) hosted by extremely fine-grained evaporite and clay minerals in the top two metres of two small dry salt lakes in the Lake Hope playa system (West Lake and East Lake, Figure 2 and ASX Release 21st March 2023).

The Mineral Resource Estimate is shown in Table 1 and is reported in accordance with the requirements of the JORC Code 2012 by resource consultants H and S Consultants Pty Ltd (H&SC) of Brisbane, Queensland. All drill hole information and assay data are provided in Appendices 1 and 2.

Table 1. Lake Hope Alumina Mineral Resources

The alumina block grade distribution for the two Mineral Resources is shown in Figure 2. The grade increases towards the centre of the lakes, and this offers an opportunity for preferential mining of the higher-grade material in the early stages of any future mine development.

Planned Production of High Purity Alumina

Playa One has developed a novel, relatively low-cost hydro-metallurgical process to convert alumina mineralisation of a type as found on Lake Hope into High Purity Alumina (HPA) with the potential to produce a purity exceeding 99.99%, (so-called 4N HPA), generally taken as the industry standard purity for product comparison. (ASX Release 21st March 2023).

Impact’s review of this novel process indicates that, together with the unique physical and chemical characteristics of the Lake Hope clays, the entire project may offer a breakthrough in the cost of HPA production and be potentially cheaper than other HPA ores such as kaolin or feldspar.

Initial and unoptimised recoveries from the bench scale test work of the process suggest that a significant proportion of the alumina resource at Lake Hope may be converted to HPA. Optimisation of the process is a key focus of the Pre-Feasibility Study currently in progress (ASX Release 6th April 2023).

Impact will also own a proportional share of the processing technology by earning an interest directly in Playa One Pty Limited via an incorporated joint venture. Further details on the joint venture are provided at the end of the report.

Other advantages of the Lake Hope Project which indicate the potential for low-cost production of HPA include (ASX Release 21st March 2023):

  • The naturally occurring and homogeneous micron-sized particles in the clay, which can be mined by free-digging and will require no comminution, grinding, classification, or wet-dry screening.
  • The clay can be dug up and trucked to an off-site processing facility, likely to be in either Kalgoorlie or Perth where permitting will more straightforward (Figure 1)
  • A simple wash and filtration circuit is all that is required for upfront processing.
  • A low-temperature sulphuric acid leach can be used which is a generally readily available and is a cheaper acid than others.
  • The sulphuric acid leach also eliminates the front-end energy-intensive calcination required in the kaolin hydrochloric acid leach process, thus significantly reducing energy costs, flow sheet complexity and CO2 emissions.

Next Steps

In order to accelerate the development timeline for Lake Hope, a Scoping Study and Pre-Feasibility Study (PFS) on Lake Hope are being run in tandem. The Scoping Study, to be completed in the third Quarter of 2023, will comprise high-level assumptions about the economic potential of the project based on the new resource, mining studies, preliminary metallurgical recoveries and likely offtake prices.

The PFS, which will be completed in mid-2024 will be based on more detailed studies which are in progress (ASX Release 6th April 2023). This work includes metallurgical optimisation test work, baseline flora, fauna and groundwater surveys, and geotechnical, logistics and freight studies.

As part of the PFS, an initial cultural and heritage survey with the Ngadju First Nations group will be completed in early July. This is a key part of the process to allow Impact to lodge its first ever Mining Lease Application over Lake Hope in the next Quarter.


Click here for the full ASX Release

This article includes content from Impact Minerals, licensed for the purpose of publishing on Investing News Australia. This article does not constitute financial product advice. It is your responsibility to perform proper due diligence before acting upon any information provided here. Please refer to our full disclaimer here.

IPT:AU
The Conversation (0)
Pilbara region, Western Australia, Australia.

Pilbara 2.0: Inside Australia’s Newest Gold Frontier

The Central Pilbara region of Western Australia is undergoing a quiet revolution that is rapidly reshaping the global gold exploration landscape.

Once dismissed as a technically challenging and geologically inconsistent terrain, Pilbara is now emerging as one of the world’s most exciting new gold frontiers and drawing serious attention from institutional investors, driven by transformative discoveries, a maturing geological model and a wave of junior explorers tapping into underexplored intrusive-hosted systems.

Anchored by the multimillion-ounce Hemi discovery — one of the most significant gold finds in Australia in over a decade — this region is not just proving its geological potential, but also demonstrating the kind of scale, consistency and margin profile that modern gold investors seek. As the discovery window remains wide open and valuations are still accessible, the Central Pilbara presents a rare opportunity for early exposure to what may become one of Australia’s next tier-one gold districts.

Keep reading...Show less
A mining truck within the outline of Australia's map on a clear day.

Is Australia on the Brink of a New Mining Super Cycle?

Mining remains as a cornerstone of Australia’s GDP and export earnings, but current global challenges such as trade disputes and price changes may be straining its foundations.

A recent FocusEconomics report tackled Australia’s resource wealth, tracing from the gold rushes of the 1850s to the iron ore and coal booms of the 21st century.

Keep reading...Show less
Kobo Resources Confirms Additional High-Grade Gold Mineralization at Kossou with 15.5 m at 2.3 g/t Au, incl. 8.3 m at 3.43 g/t Au; Outlines Next Phase of Exploration at Kossou

Kobo Resources Confirms Additional High-Grade Gold Mineralization at Kossou with 15.5 m at 2.3 g/t Au, incl. 8.3 m at 3.43 g/t Au; Outlines Next Phase of Exploration at Kossou

 
  •   High-grade gold intercepts highlighted by 15.5 m at 2.30 g/t Au, incl. 8.3 m at 3.43 g/t Au at the Road Cut Zone  
  •  
  •   Initial drilling on the gap between Jagger and Road Cut Zone confirms target structure, warrants further testing  
  •  
  •   Current drill phase complete; Geological modelling and planning underway for 15,000 m drill program expected to begin in H2 2025  
  •  

 

 Kobo Resources Inc. (" Kobo" or the " Company ") ( TSX.V: KRI ) is pleased to report additional diamond drill results from the Road Cut Zone at its 100%-owned Kossou Gold Project (" Kossou ") in Côte d'Ivoire. Results from these holes continue to strengthen the Company's understanding of the key structural controls that define this prospective target area.

News Provided by Business Wire via QuoteMedia

Keep reading...Show less
Maritime Resources (TSXV:MAE)

Maritime Resources

Keep reading...Show less

Latest Press Releases

Related News

×