Johannesburg. – Recent promising platinum group metals (PGMs) discoveries by Impala Platinum’s exploration partner in Canada, Transition Metals Corporation, underscore the possibility that South Africa’s hard-pressed platinum miners could look elsewhere for their growth.
Implats, together with Anglo American Platinum and Lonmin, are in their fourth week of a strike by members of the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union, which is costing the three companies about R200 million a day in lost revenue.
Implats also has substantial PGM resources in Zimbabwe. But continual changes in Zimbabwean laws relating to mining ownership and taxation have made it an uncertain environment.
The investment community has traditionally attributed no value to the Zimbabwean resources in Implats’ share price valuation.
Outside Africa, there are viable PGM deposits in Russia, where Norilsk Nickel mines, and in North America. Stillwater Platinum operates in Montana, US, and North American Palladium has a mine in Ontario, Canada.
PGM deposits outside Southern African are much higher in palladium, which is used in auto-catalysts for petrol-driven cars. Most of the light-duty cars sold in the US and China are petrol-driven.
Late last month, Transition Metals, which is in a 50/ 50 joint venture with Implats on the Sunday Lake exploration project in Ontario, announced that out of six drill holes, four had intersected significant platinum mineralisation.
The best hole intersected a reef 20,2 million thick containing 3,22g per tonne of PGMs, including platinum, palladium, gold, copper and nickel.
Transition Metals CEO Scott McLean said the size of the intrusion, multiple mineralised environments and high platinum grades were very encouraging and might indicate a large-scale mineralised system. Implats corporate relations manager Alice Lourens said on Monday the Implats-Transition project was in its very early stages.
“Implats has been in partnership with Transition Metals for a number of years in Ontario, particularly targeting the so-called Midcontinent Rift-type deposits.”
Ms Lourens said Implats had limited its offshore exploration spending over the past year, mainly because of cash constraints. No exploration was taking place in Africa outside South Africa but there was still some exploration in Canada.
Transition’s Sunday Lake property is 25km north of Thunder Bay, in the same vicinity as North American Palladium’s flagship Lac des Iles mine.
Lac des Iles has been operating since 1993 and is producing about 135 000oz of palladium a year at a cash cost of US$500-US$600/oz.
This year it is targeting 175 000/oz at a cash cost falling to US$450/oz by the fourth quarter. – BusinessDay.