THE CONFERENCE CALLER: There has been plenty of action at Venture Minerals’ 100 per cent-owned Riley DSO iron ore mine in Tasmania as the company made serious moves to cash in on the current high demand and price for iron ore.

Venture completed an updated Riley Iron Ore Mining Study with an associated Pre-Feasibility Study (PFS) that demonstrated strong returns from a low capex two-year project, the company believes to be well positioned to capture the current higher iron ore price environment.

In addition to completing the study, having previously signed a Binding Terms Sheet for the Riley Iron Ore Mine off-take with Prosperity Steel, Venture signed a full off-take agreement for the Riley product for 100 per cent of the first two years of iron ore production.

“The Riley Iron Ore Mining Study demonstrates the delivery of an exceptional Internal Rate of Return in excess of 300 per cent is possible by leveraging the relatively small capex required to commence production,” Venture Minerals managing director Andrew Radonjic said.

The Riley DSO project is located 10km from the Mt Lindsay tin-tungsten deposit.

The Mt Lindsay project covers 148 square kilometres in north-western Tasmania within the contact metamorphic aureole of the highly perspective Meredith Granite.

The project sits between the world class Renison Bell Tin Mine (Metals X Ltd/Yunnan Tin Group where more than 231,000 tonnes of tin metal has been produced since 1968) and the Savage River Magnetite Mine (operating for around 45 years, currently producing approximately 2.5 million tonnes per annum of iron pellets).

Venture Minerals was able to secure co-funding from the Tasmanian Government to drill test priority EM targets at the company’s Mt Lindsay tin project in 2020.

Venture Minerals enjoyed a successful outcome of submissions it made to the Tasmanian State Government, receiving for co-funding of up to $202,000 for exploration drilling to be carried out at three priority targets the company generated via a recently completed Major EM Survey over the Mount Lindsay project.

The EM Survey identified several strong conductors coinciding with previously gathered exploration data to define priority drill targets, which included Renison Bell-style high-grade tin, Mount Lindsay-style tin-tungsten and nickel sulphide targets.

The Mount Lindsay project is already classified by the Australian Government as a Critical Minerals Project with an advanced tin-tungsten asset, which Venture Minerals believes will only be further enhanced by the delineation of several high-priority drill targets of the same style of mineralisation through the recently completed major EM Survey.

Venture claims Mount Lindsay as being one of the largest undeveloped tin projects in the world, containing in excess of 80,000 tonnes of tin metal and within the same mineralised body a tungsten resource containing 3.2 million MTU (metric tonne units) of tungsten.

Tin is now a fundamental metal to the battery revolution and new technology and the International Tin Association is predicting a surge in demand driven by the lithium-ion battery market of up to 60,000 tonnes per annum by 2030 (world tin consumption was 363,500 tonnes in 2018).

Venture has demonstrated the Renison-style target to be a strong EM conductor supported at the surface by tin in soil anomalism and an alluvial Tin Field mined over 100 years ago, a coincidental magnetic anomaly, and is sitting within the same carbonate units and potentially the same fault zone (Federal-Basset Fault) that hosts the Renison Bell Tin Mine.

“The successful submission for co-funded drilling (in 2020) of some of our priority drill targets generated by the recently completely Major EM Survey at Mount Lindsay validates the strength of all the numerous priority targets at Mount Lindsay that include Renison-style tin, Mount Lindsay-style tin-tungsten and nickel sulphide targets,” Radonjic said.

“With the increased exploration potential at Mount Lindsay combined with its current status as one of the largest undeveloped tin assets in the world, clearly Mount Lindsay is a leading Australian Critical Minerals Project.

“The Australian Government said that global demand for Australian resources has broadened in recent years to include minerals used in a range of emerging high-tech applications across a variety of sectors such as renewable energy, aerospace, defence, automotive (particularly electric vehicles), telecommunications and agri-tech.

“Known as critical minerals, this group of minerals is considered essential for the economic and industrial development of major and emerging economies.”

The company also has projects in Western Australia at the Thor prospect, the Pingaring project, the Odin prospect and the Caesar project.

Drilling at Thor intersected massive sulphides confirming a 20 kilometre VMS style system.

Email: info@ventureminerals.com.au
Web: www.ventureminerals.com.au
Directors: Mel Ashton, Hamish Halliday, Andrew Radonjic, John Jetter