In what is likely to quicken pulses around the ASX floors, Galan Lithium has drawn first blood at its Greenbushes South project in WA, with recent airborne radiometric, magnetic and digital elevation modelling survey data unveiling the first pegmatite lens at the operation. The discovery has the added allure in that it is a mere 15km from the Greenbushes mine, the world’s largest hard-rock lithium deposit.
Galan says interpretation of the newly acquired data has lifted the lid on an 18-piece arrangement of priority target zones begging for the drill bit. According to the company, each precinct is within the revered Donnybrook sheer zone and could house lithium-bearing pegmatites.
The airborne geophysical survey was initially acquired by Galan and passed onto Southern Geoscience Consultants, who was contracted to process the data, interpret the results and draw up a shortlist of key targets.
Data from Galan's field mapping activities, surface geochemistry, along with structural and lithological information was also fed into the consultancy group’s target generation process.
Management says follow-up mapping and sampling of its first target site “GS11” has led to the discovery of an outcropping pegmatite lens that appears about 200m x 40m in size.
Interestingly, Galan says the pegmatite shares macroscopic mineralogy akin to those found within pegmatites at the Greenbushes lithium mine to the north.
The revered Greenbushes lithium mine pumps out about 1.95 million tonnes of lithium spodumene per year and if Perth-based Galan can prove up the discovery towards an operation that punches out anywhere close to that, the battery metal player will be off to the races.
The company has since bagged up a number of soil and rock chip samples from GS11 and sent them to an assay laboratory to help determine what sort of beast might be lurking below the surface.
The goal of the soil sample program is to identify probable pegmatites at depth by sniffing out near-surface pathfinder elements including arsenic, tin, caesium, tantalum and rubidium.
Galan has also got its hands on the conservation management plan for a tenement in the nearby Donnelly State Forest that could see it dive into another round of exploration.
Pegmatite-derived mineralisation, particularly tin and tantalum, has been the focus of investigation across the Greenbushes South tenements since the early 1900s. Recent exploration, however, has been primarily focused on the discovery of base metals and lithium pegmatites.
Early last year, Galan agreed to sell and form a joint venture with the original owners of the ground, Lithium Australia NL, for an 80 per cent ownership stake in the Greenbushes South project, 200km south of Perth.
Outside of its Australian home base Galan also has its foot on a lithium equivalent resource of over 2 million tonnes at its wholly owned Hombre Muerto West brine project in the Argentinean province of Catamarca, where the company is pressing ahead with a definitive feasibility study.
Galan’s pegmatite discovery is on the doorstep of the world’s most significant battery metal plays and should the ball continue to bounce its way, the market meerkats will be bolt upright in anticipation of further news flow.
Is your ASX-listed company doing something interesting? Contact: matt.birney@businessnews.com.au
By Matt Birney
