Western Copper and Gold inches toward startup at its giant Casino copper porphyry deposit as others advance earlier stage projects.

While one would-be miner in Canada's Yukon Territory guides its giant copper project toward development, several juniors – ranging from newcomers to more established players – are picking up the pace in the search for other rich deposits of the red metal.

Western Copper and Gold Corp. is marking its 16th year of working to develop its huge Casino copper-gold-molybdenum project.

The diligent company has completed two pre-feasibility studies and a full feasibility study on the project since it was acquired in 2008.

In 2020, the explorer released an updated resource for Casino, in June 2021 a preliminary economic assessment and most recently, in June 2022, a feasibility study showing robust economics.

The Casino property lies in the Whitehorse Mining District, about 300 kilometers (186 miles) northwest of the territorial capital. It comprises 1,136 full and partial quartz claims and 55 placer claims covering more than 21,616 hectares (about 83.5 square miles). In mid-2019, the explorer also acquired the adjacent Canadian Creek property to the west from Cariboo Rose Resources Ltd.

Giant in the making

At full operation, Casino is expected to process 120,000 dry metric tons of ore per day, or 43.8 million dry metric tons per year. Metals to be recovered are copper, gold, molybdenum and silver. Over 27 years, this mine is expected to produce 6.95 million ounces gold, 361 million oz silver, 4.27 billion pounds of copper, and 346 million lb of molybdenum.

The feasibility study for development of Casino envisions processing 1.3 billion metric tons of mineralized material for a mill and heap leach operation. This operation is estimated to generate an after-tax net present value (8% discount) of C$2.3 billion, an 18% internal rate of return, and cash flow over the first four years of $951 million per year. Based on these economics, it is expected to take about 3.3 years to payback the initial C$3.62 billion (US$2.65 billion) in capital costs estimated to build the mine.

In December, Western Copper and Gold praised a decision by the government of Yukon to invest C$21.4 million in redevelopment of dock infrastructure at the Port of Skagway to include a Marine Services Platform to continue the historic support of ore exports from Yukon mining. Most recently, the Alaska port provided loading services to oceangoing ships transporting copper concentrates from the now shuttered Minto Mine to overseas markets.

In April, Western Copper raised nearly C$46 million (US$33.7 million) in a bought deal public offering, which it said will be used mainly to advance permitting and engineering at Casino.

Mining major Rio Tinto also exercised an option to purchase additional Western Copper shares to maintain a 9.7% ownership interest in the junior, a move that generated an additional C$5 million (US$3.7 million) in net proceeds.

Cathie Archbould

Over the past 18 years, Western has outlined more than 10 billion pounds of copper, 21 million oz of gold, and 169 million oz silver at the Casino deposit.

Rich resource in Yukon

Copper in Yukon occurs in a variety of deposit types across the length and breadth of the territory, some of which have been mined since the early 1900s.

Historically, the most significant production (more than 10 million metric tons of ore grading 1.5% copper, with significant gold and silver credits) came from the Whitehorse Copper Belt, a series of copper skarn deposits that form along a 30-kilometer- (19 miles) long trend. Though the mines of this copper belt have been decommissioned, a historical estimate of about 3 million metric tons of resources grading 0.95% copper remain in seven separate deposits, along with the potential for additional discoveries of skarn- and porphyry-style mineralization.

The Carmacks Copper belt, an even larger trend of copper mineralization, is centered on the past producing Minto mine northwest of Whitehorse.

The large Cretaceous and Jurassic porphyry deposits are found along the Carmacks Copper Belt running along the Dawson Range of central Yukon.

In addition to the Jurassic Minto alkalic copper-gold-silver porphyry deposit where mining occurred until recently, the belt also hosts the Carmacks copper-gold property at Williams Creek, which is located 50 kilometers (31 miles) southeast of the Minto deposit. The oxidized deposit hosts more than 824 million lb of measured and indicated resources and 29 million lbs. inferred copper-equivalent metal within a National Instrument 43-101-compliant resource of 36.2 million metric tons grading 1.07% copper-equivalent (0.81% copper, 0.31 g/t gold, 3.41 g/t silver).

Granite Creek Copper Ltd., which is exploring the Carmacks property, recently reported plans for 2024 exploration that includes up to 1,800 meters of diamond drilling focused on new targets within 1,000 meters of proposed pits identified in a 2021 preliminary economic assessment. The Gap, Sour Toe and Zone 1213 targets have been refined by induced polarity surveys, trenching and soil sampling.

"Recent positive price action in the metals, specifically copper and gold, has brought new interest to the sector. This paired with the exploration upside at Carmacks creates the phenomenal opportunity to increase shareholder value," observed Granite Creek President and CEO Tim Johnson in a May 28 statement.

Eyeing nearby prospects

Others also recently reported promising results from new exploration for copper on promising properties throughout the territory.

Forge Resources Corp. recently completed the first two drill holes exploring its Alotta property to a depth of 402 and 501 meters, respectively, and both holes showed porphyry style mineralization.

Forge also reported continuation of the phase-one drilling with a third drill hole, which is testing the property's Severance Zone.

"Every drillhole completed is bringing us closer to understanding the controls to the mineralization at Alotta. We have now started drilling at the untested Severance Zone which has extensive and highly anomalous multi-element soil geochemistry," said Forge Resources President Lorne Warner.

The three proposed holes will test across the entire anomalous soil geochemistry in the central area of the Alotta zones, he added.

The Alotta property consists of 96 mineral claims that cover about 1,926 hectares (4,759 acres) located 50 kilometers (31 miles) southeast of the Casino deposit.

The two primary targets at Alotta are the Payout and Severance zones, located in the west-central and east-central parts of the property. These two zones have significant surface mineralization, which comprise highly anomalous gold, copper and molybdenum values from rock and soil samples. These targets represent the areas of the property with significant (greater than 1 g/t gold) rock values on surface.

For preliminary drilling, geologists recommended a total of four holes to test surface mineralization and geophysical anomalies at depth. At both targets, the first hole was designed as a shallow angle hole to test the extent of mineralization directly beneath the prospective area, while the second is steeper to test for deeper mineralization and corresponding chargeability/resistivity anomalies present in the vicinity, the company said.

In a later drilling phase, Forge said it will test two additional drill targets – Alimony and Commission.

The Alimony target is a significant 1200-meter by 500-meter molybdenum-gold soil anomaly that coincides with overlapping chargeability and resistivity anomalies.

In the eastern part of the property, the Commission target is defined by a 1500-meter by 1,000-meter gold-copper-molybdenum soil anomaly, which corresponds to magnetic low to moderate response. A well-constrained resistivity anomaly is present that coincides with strongly anomalous gold and copper soil values, the explorer added.

Yukon Metals Corp. has doubled its land position from an initial 18,000 hectares (44,478 acres) acquired as part of the Berdahl property transaction announced in January, to 36,000 hectares (88,956 acres) after considerable staking over the past few months, expanding the initially acquired Yukon portfolio.

Areas of focus in this staking program include the high-priority AZ property, surrounding its Talbot property, as well as a new set of prospective claims near the Alaska Highway, which has been named "Fairway."

"During these past months, prior to the closing of the acquisition, the company has been busy staking ground around two key properties, AZ and Talbot, as well as staking new claims at Fairway. AZ is a high-priority potential copper-gold porphyry asset, while Talbot hosts a substantial gold and silver anomaly. Both AZ and Fairway are within 20 kilometers (12 miles) of the Alaska Highway," said Yukon Metals President and CEO Rory Quinn. "I look forward to sharing ongoing details of what is going to be a busy exploration season."

The AZ and Fairway claim area was prospected by Ron Berdahl in the early 1990s while working for Noranda. Copper mineralization has been noted on the AZ property; rock float assays returned an average of 10% copper, along with 126 g/t silver and 7.08 g/t gold from four samples in 1993.

The Fairway property covers 2,552 hectares (6,306 acres) in 126 new claims.

The AZ and Fairway properties are located 10 and 18 kilometers (six and 11 miles), respectively, from the Alaska Highway.

Other polymetallic deposits with rich copper resources occur throughout the territory, and geologists theorize that billions of years ago the Yukon and the continent of Australia were joined in one giant land mass known as Pangea.