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9.4m of 17.5% rare earths and 0.05% gallium cut at Alces Lake Metal Tech News – December 1, 2021
Assay results confirm that Appia Rare Earths & Uranium Corp. (formerly Appia Energy Corp.) has discovered another zone of high-grade mineralization at its Alces Lake high-grade rare earth elements and gallium property in the Athabasca Basin area of northern Saskatchewan.
Since its first detailed exploration program at Alces Lake in 2017, Appia has identified 74 rare earth, gallium, and uranium bearing surface zones and occurrences at the project, suggesting a robust critical minerals system across the 88,173-acre (35,682 hectares) project.
In June, the company launched what is shaping up to be a roughly 7,600-meter drill program, the largest ever carried out at Alces Lake.
Much of this drilling is targeting WRCB, a roughly 150-meter-long area that encompasses four interrelated zones of high-grade rare earths and gallium mineralization – Wilson, Richard, Charles, and Bell.
In October, Appia announced that its drilling had discovered a thick zone of massive and semi-massive monazite, the mineral that hosts the rare earths and gallium at Alces Lake, in a new zone to the northeast of Wilson.
"Our modelling had predicted that Wilson and Richard were essentially the same zone, but it now appears there are multiple sub-parallel zones," Appia Rare Earths Vice President of Exploration Nicolas Guest said at the time. "The discovery of new massive and semi-massive monazite at Wilson North in-between these two areas show how our model is evolving with each new hole, and our eyes have been opened to what is possible in this high-grade mineral system."
Assays results show the Wilson North discovery hole cut a wide zone of high-grade rare earth mineralization.
From a depth of 15.2 meters, hole 21-WRC-015 cut 9.38 meters averaging 17.53% total rare earth oxides and 0.05% gallium trioxide, including 2.14 meters averaging an astounding 32.17% TREO and 0.08% gallium trioxide.
"The Wilson North discovery was important to confirm the continuity of WRCB REEs and confirms Appia's geological understanding as this discovery is further delineated," said Appia Rare Earths President Frederick Kozak. "The intercept from 21-WRC-015 is high-grade, but most importantly, its width is far superior to any previous intercept at Alces Lake, which continues to confirm the potential of this discovery area."
In addition to the wide zone of near-surface rare earths drilled at Wilson North, the company reported results from three holes drilled this year at Richard.
Highlights from this drilling include:
• 3.49 meters averaging 3.31% TREO and 0.01% gallium trioxide from a depth of 8.2 meters in hole 21-WRC-009.
• 4.3 meters averaging 3.62% TREO and 0.01% gallium trioxide from a depth of 34.5 meters in hole 21-WRC-015.
• 3.33 meters averaging 7.98% TREO and 0.02% gallium trioxide from a depth of 11.2 meters in hole 21-WRC-044.
The gallium grades are economically significant.
By way of example, it is estimated that the ore intermittently mined over a century at Apex Mine in Utah, which was the only primary mined source of gallium and germanium in the United States before it was closed in 2011, averaged about 0.032% gallium.
More information about gallium and what it could mean for Alces Lake can be read at Techy gallium overshadowed by rare earths in the Critical Minerals Alliances magazine published by Data Mine North.
Appia plans to incorporate the results from its 2021 program and 4,480 meters of previous drilling completed in the WRCB area into a maiden resource for this high-grade rare earths and gallium area of Alces Lake.
With more than 16 years of covering mining, Shane is renowned for his insights and and in-depth analysis of mining, mineral exploration and technology metals.
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