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NEWS
POZ hunts ‘missing’ diamonds
POZ Minerals Ltd is using modern that are lighting up are quite startling
geophysics to locate the “miss-
ing diamonds†from its Blina dia- and we’re really excited about sam-
mond project in the Kimberley.
pling them.â€
Blina, 120km west of Derby, has
passed through many hands over POZ holds four granted mining
the years, with the likes of De Beers,
Diamond Ventures Exploration Pty leases with two Native Title agree-
Ltd and Kimberley Diamonds Ltd all
having varying degrees of success ments for Blina, having negotiated
at the project.
terms with the Warrwa Combined
One of the key drawcards for ex-
plorers is the quality, clarity and col- and Bunuba groups prior to Christ-
our of the fancy yellow diamonds on
offer, as well as the large quantity mas.
of alluvial stones spread over the
tenements. “Because we’ve now got granted
However, few companies have mining licences, as soon as we
sustained long-term success at
the project because the diamonds find one or two samples that come
widely thought to be there are yet to be
located. together at high grade, we can go
POZ chairman Jim Richards wants straight into mining,†Richards said.
to change that and believes the latest
geophysics tools will help his company “It’s just a shallow alluvial opera-
better define targets which can then be
unlocked through bulk sampling and trial tion, very simple mining and recov-
mining.
ery of the shallow alluvial material.
“Modern geophysics is considerably
better than it was 10 years ago and I The mining is very straight forward;
think that’s helped the explorers quite a
bit,†Richards told Paydirt. “I’ve always A fancy yellow diamond it’s the geology which is key to un-
felt the latest generation diamond discov-
eries in Australia would be driven more locking this.â€
by geophysics and geomorphological
models than they used to be by mineral- we’re looking for and could even lead to Trial mining equipment was being pur-
ogical and geological models.
us very, very quickly becoming a produc- chased or contracted at the time of print,
“The project is one of the very few con-
sistent sources of fancy yellow diamonds er,†he said. which will enable POZ to hit the ground
in the world, so that’s why people keep
coming back. If you can unlock the geo- “The only way to really test these tar- running once the wet season concludes
logical conundrum of the alluvial channel
there, then there is a mighty prize await- gets is to bulk sample them. Even drilling at the end of March.
ing you in terms of grade and potentially
tonnage, too.†doesn’t work particularly well because POZ has set an exploration target of
Historic grades for bulk samples within the alluvial material is the same as the 1.6-4.1 mct grading 2.3-4.1ct/cu m for
the alluvial channels at Blina range from
4-10.5ct per 100cu m. Diamonds within bedrock material and it’s virtually impos- Blina, with the upper end of that estimate
the channels are also usually quite shal-
low, within an average depth of 2-8m. sible to tell them apart in RAB drilling.†equating to a project valuation of more
POZ is targeting a series of high- Richards said three key milestones than $2 billion, based on current stone
grade trap sites at the project which new
ground-penetrating radar (GPR) geo- had helped Blina emerge from sleeper valuations.
physics have been able to successfully
define, unlike previous explorers. project in his company’s portfolio at the “You can potentially have some mas-
Richards said his company would start of last year to flagship asset for sive, massive paybacks if you can strike
sample the “very best and most prospec-
tive†of the anomalous targets. 2018. some of that kind of pay dirt,†Richards
“We intend to bulk sample and trial An extensive review of $30 million said. “In very, very quick time you can
mine these areas in 2018 and we think
that will give us some of the answers worth of historical data initially opened make huge amounts of money and that’s
up a number of prospective targets, with why POZ Minerals is in alluvial dia-
the company then using GPR geophys- monds.â€
ics to pinpoint nine high-grade targets – Michael Washbourne
within the Terrace 5 paleochannel.
“Targets from the GPR survey actu-
ally correlate with the historical data, so
we’ve got quite a high degree of confi-
dence about it,†Richards said. “This lat-
est GPR data is repeatable, it ties in nice-
ly with the original data. The new targets
POZ Minerals Ltd is set to become the largest shareholder in proposed new float Ac-
celerate Resources Ltd.
Accelerate is due to list on the ASX this month, having acquired POZ’s Mt Monger
and Bulgera gold projects in Western Australia via a conditional sale agreement for an
IPO.
POZ director Grant Mooney will be non-executive chairman of Accelerate, with Yaxi
Zhan (managing director), Andrew Haythorpe (executive director) and Terry Topping
(non-executive director) filling the other board positions.
“We’re going to have a significant core shareholding in what I think will be a very well
managed company with good connections into China for fundraising,†POZ chairman
Jim Richards said.
Accelerate will also have the Comet and Pilbara gold projects in WA, as well as the
Mt Read cobalt project in Tasmania, in its portfolio.
PAGE 18 FEBRUARY 2018 AUSTRALIA’S PAYDIRT
