Shareholders at Wednesday’s annual general meeting in Perth were told Julimar has “so much more to give”, with rich drilling intercepts from holes sunk over the northern end of the project’s flagship Gonneville deposit indicating mineralisation containing nickel, copper, platinum and palladium extends further than estimated.
Gonneville, situated on Chalice-owned farmland 70km north-east of Perth, is at the heart of a scoping study on a development of Julimar expected to be completed near the end of 2022.
The deposit is part of a 30km-long zone of mineralisation stretching north-east that has been described as the world’s biggest nickel sulphide discovery in the past 20 years and the largest find of platinum group elements in Australian mining history.
Chalice said the new drilling had intercepted several “outstanding broad zones” of mineralisation up to 650m beyond the previously delineated resource at Gonneville, “materially extending the high-grade sulphide zones” at the northern end.
The intersections, which included 157m grading 0.8 per cent of nickel equivalent, highlighted “the significant short-term potential” of improving the high-grade portion of the Gonneville deposit, the company said.
“Gonneville itself has just got so much more to give,” Chalice chief executive Alex Dorsch told shareholders.
He said the latest drilling results were among the top-10 best intercepts ever recorded by Chalice at Gonneville.
Chalice sees Julimar’s metals as feeding the global demand for battery metals regarded as crucial to the expanding global push into electrification and renewable energy.
A challenge will be developing the parts of Julimar covered by State forest.
The company has so far identified a resource of 350 million tonnes grading 0.58 per cent of nickel equvilent and plans to push ahead in 2023 to secure the approvals it needs to mine the project.
It has been in talks for some time with potential partners in a development, its production or Chalice itself, with the annual meeting told already strong interest had increased with the growing geopolitical tensions this year.
“The discussions are very early stage at the moment, but interest levels are high,” Mr Dorsch said. He added that Chalice would seek to advance the talks when the scoping study was completed.
