Boadicea ‘catapults’ into serious lithium explorer with deal to acquire Bald Hill East tenement

The nearby Bald Hill lithium mine.

Boadicea Resources Ltd (ASX:BOA) is set to “catapult” into a serious explorer for lithium with its proposed acquisition of a tenement to be named Bald Hill East, adjacent to a lithium mine and processing plant in Western Australia.

Proactive Investors has reported, the company is paying A$300,000 plus a 1.5% net smelter return (NSR) royalty for exploration licence E15/1608.

Bald Hill East is highly prospective for pegmatite-hosted lithium and tantalum mineralisation.

The company plans to immediately conduct field reconnaissance and geochemical auger sampling, in the first quarter of 2022 to generate targets for drill testing during 2022.

BOA is focused on expanding into electric vehicle (EV) metals with a balanced portfolio of nickel, copper, cobalt and now lithium assets.

Serious lithium explorer

Boadicea managing director Jon Reynolds said: “The acquisition of Bald Hill East catapults Boadicea into a serious explorer for lithium.

“Bald Hill East has anomalism for lithium pegmatites and is located close to an existing lithium mine and processing facility, which enhances the commercialisation of any Boadicea lithium discovery.

“We are making significant strides to be an explorer that meets the demands of the metals that will deliver a cleaner and greener future to feed the EV market which requires significant injection of new lithium discoveries to come into production.”

The news has resulted in shares rising by as much as 11% to an intraday high of 21 cents.

 

Bald Hill East tenement

Bald Hill lithium mine is 65 kilometres southeast of Kambalda in the Eastern Goldfields region, around 75 kilometres southeast of the Mt Marion lithium project and about 350 kilometres by road from the Port of Esperance.

Most recent mine operator was Alita Minerals Ltd and the mine is currently in care and maintenance due to ongoing litigation and the expectation is that the mining operation will restart when ownership issues are resolved.

The Bald Hill area has been mined for alluvial tantalite from the early 1970s to the 1980s.

It was during tantalite mining that pegmatite ore containing commercial quantities of spodumene was discovered below thin cover.

Bald Hill hard rock lithium operation produced a top-quality +1mm spodumene concentrate (low mica, low iron) and a significant tantalum by-product.

This lithium operation was commissioned in March 2018 with an initial spodumene concentrate production capacity of 155,000 tonnes per annum and first lithium concentrate shipment was completed in early May 2018.

The project is based on lithium resources of 26.5 million tonnes at 1.0% lithium oxide (using 0.3% lithium oxide cut off) and 149ppm tantalum oxide and additional tantalum resources of 4.4 million tonnes at 336ppm tantalum oxide.

Reserves support an eight-year mine life at current processing rate of around 1.5 million tonnes per annum with reported upside in mine life and/or processing rate.

A March 2019 presentation from the owners noted that “the resource possibly extends to the southeast and west”.