American West flags rich critical metals in historic Utah mine waste

American West Metals’ creative dumpster-diving in Utah has come up with a remarkable handful of eye-catching critical metals assays that could add a handy new value stream to its West Desert project. 

The company says sampling of historical mine dumps and surface rocks across West Desert has returned standout grades of copper, silver and indium, along with a sprinkling of in-demand specialty metals such as germanium, tellurium and gallium.

The best bit of the story is that much of this material is already sitting at surface in old stockpiles from the district’s early silver-lead-zinc mining days, meaning it is readily accessible, while the company works through volumes, average grades and metallurgy. 

American West’s peak results from the dump sampling included 1807 grams per tonne (g/t) silver, 176.5g/t indium, 48g/t germanium, 1010g/t tellurium and 2.26 per cent copper. The same program also picked up some high base metals hits, including zinc up to 24.52 per cent and lead up to 31.30 per cent. 

The company is now planning more sampling to estimate how much material is available and its potential value, and it is also looking at bulk metallurgical test work to see how modern processing might recover metals that the old-timers left behind. 

Beyond its assessment of the old dumps, a broader rock-chip sampling program has also expanded the company’s West Desert’s mineralised footprint beyond the extents of its current resource and the historic mine workings.

American West says widespread copper, zinc, silver and indium in outcrops have been identified in areas outside the current mineral resource estimate, including along the northern margin of an interpreted porphyry system and in previously unexplored ground. 

American West Metals managing director Dave O’Neill said: “The program was designed to determine the distribution and content of critical metals within the historical waste dumps, whilst the rock sampling was completed in conjunction with, and funded by, the Utah Geological Survey for the project-wide indium study. The historical silver-lead-zinc mines at West Desert worked a series of extremely high-grade, sub-vertical lodes.”

Reported surface hits along that northern margin included zinc up to 17 per cent, lead up to 16.25 per cent and silver up to 279.3 grams per tonne, showcasing the potential prospectivity of the porphyry contact. 

The new geochemical trends are timely, given the company is already mid-stride in a 5000-metre diamond drilling campaign at the West Desert project.

As flagged in late March, the drilling program is designed to test a pipeline of high-grade indium, gallium and copper targets beyond the current resource footprint, including geophysical anomalies that look similar to the main deposit. 

The West Desert deposit contains a resource of 33.7 million tonnes containing  3.83 per cent zinc, 0.15 per cent copper, 9.1g/t silver, 20.01g/t indium and 0.11g/t gold.

With the US pushing harder to secure domestic supplies of critical minerals, American West believes its West Desert ground is well placed to fill some of that demand.

This is particularly so when it already hosts the largest undeveloped indium resource in the country, with a massive 23.7 million ounce indium endowment which could grow further as the project develops.

Now, with fresh high-grade surface clues and current drilling already acquiring new samples, this Utah story is shaping up as one to keep on the radar.

Is your ASX-listed company doing something interesting? Contact: matt.birney@businessnews.com.au