Vanadium North options Strategic project

Strategic Metals Ltd. Aug. 20 reported that it is granting Vanadium North Resources Inc. the option to purchase in the Van project in western Northwest Territories.

Located about 10 road-kilometers (six miles) north of the past producing Cantung tungsten mine, the 38-square-kilometer (14.7 square miles) Van property hosts a major sediment-hosted vanadium prospect that has not seen focused exploration since 1985.

Currently, vanadium is primarily used as an alloy metal. In this capacity, a small amount of vanadium adds strength and heat resistance to the metal it is alloyed with. Ferrovanadium, a vanadium-iron alloy, is used in high-stress auto parts such as gears, axles and crankshafts. Titanium-vanadium alloys are used in jet engines.

An emerging use of this critical metal is in vanadium redox batteries, also known as vanadium flow batteries. Taking advantage of vanadium's ability to exist in solution in four different oxidation states, the vanadium redox battery uses one electroactive element instead of separate elements for the cathode and anode.

Lying along the eastern margin of the Selwyn Basin, the vanadium mineralization at Van is principally developed in a moderately to steeply dipping, sooty black, carbonaceous, siliceous mudstone unit. Geological mapping done in conjunction with chip sampling and diamond drilling indicates that this unit is at least 50 meters thick and extends over a considerable strike length.

Two lines of continuous chip samples collected 600 meters apart across the prospective horizon returned weighted averages of 0.58 and 0.61 percent vanadium pentoxide (V2O5) over true widths of 56.1 and 60.2 meters, respectively. A diamond drill hole completed between the chip sample lines averaged 0.42 percent V2O5 over 52.5 meters, within a broader zone averaging 0.3 percent V2O5 over 110 meters.

With bedrock exposure being very limited at Van, Strategic Metals said the length of the mineralized zone is probably much greater than 600 meters, since this type of deposit tends to have a large depositional area in relation to the thickness of mineralization.

Vanadium North can earn full ownership of Van by investing at least C$90,000 into the property by Nov. 1; delivering 19.9 percent of Vanadium North shares to Strategic within 10 days of going public, including a C$2 million initial public offering or concurrent financing, as applicable; and maintaining all mining claims comprising the Van project in good standing until Dec. 21, 2019 by completing all assessment filings or making cash-in-lieu payments with the Northwest Territories Mining Recorder on or before Dec. 15, 2018.

Strategic will retain a 2 percent net smelter return royalty in any commercial production, half of which can be purchased for C$1 million any time prior to the commencement of commercial production.

–SHANE LASLEY