GreenTech on trail of Pilbara pegmatite patch

ASX-listed junior GreenTech Metals is leaps and bounds into a project-scale field program targeting historic lithium and recently identified soil geochemical anomalies in Western Australia.

The company today revealed it had identified nine broad lithium soil anomalous zones across its West Pilbara licence package, which covers a total area of 32 square kilometres and has more than 60sq km that are still to be mapped. Importantly, according to GreenTech, several of its target areas have the potential to support significant occurrences of lithium-bearing pegmatites.

Mapping and recent soil and chip sample results have confirmed the discovery of new occurrences of lithium-bearing pegmatites in the Wally, Osborne and Maddox Zones, which correlate well with several other lithium soil anomalies and regional structures.

The newly-discovered pegmatite zones are about 5km south of the company’s Kobe pegmatite zone that has tossed out high-grade lithium assays up to a stunning 1.8 per cent lithium oxide.

GreenTech recently conducted a review of its historical soil geochemical database that helped etch out a pair of lithium-caesium-tantalum (LCT) pegmatite trends – the Northern and Southern pegmatite trends – that stretch up to 7.5km and 2.5km in strike length, respectively. Boots-on-ground fieldwork confirmed the presence of significant pegmatite swarms in both trends.

The Northern LCT pegmatite trend, which includes GreenTech’s original Kobe discovery, lies within the company’s wholly-owned Ruth Well tenure and extends eastward into the Osborne joint venture (JV) it shares with Artemis Resources.

Close by, the Southern LCT pegmatite trend is housed within the Osborne JV tenure and has been mapped through a strike length of 2.5km. A duo of high-grade rock-chip samples tipping the scales at 2.3 per cent and 3.63 per cent lithium oxide were returned in late July, piquing early market interest. Follow-up samples from the Ruth Well project area sent for assay have now been returned with multiple high lithium grades, including two at 2.4 per cent lithium oxide from the Osborne and Wally pegmatite zones.

The Wally zone is a 1km-long, north-east/south-west-trending zone of lithium pegmatites, with outcrop widths of up to 100m. Pegmatites in the region are moderate to steeply-dipping towards the north. The Osborne pegmatite domain is a 500m-long, north-west/south-east-dipping zone of lithium-bearing pegmatites, with moderately north-dipping outcrops up to 15m wide.

Current sampling has returned multiple high-grade assays including 2.4 per cent lithium oxide, but historic samples threw up an eye-catching 3.6 per cent.

GreenTech says its reconnaissance mapping and sampling programs are expected to be completed before the end of the month, with follow-up work to include infill sampling and continued higher-resolution mapping. In addition, the company plans to process acquired high-resolution satellite imagery and undertake preparations for a maiden drilling program.

Equipped with new data garnered from its latest discoveries, the company hopes to identify new lithium pegmatite trends and extend the known trends.

GreenTech’s projects sit tantalisingly close to Azure Minerals’ impressive Andover lithium discovery. Azure recently revealed a ground-breaking 209m high-grade lithium hit averaging 1.42 per cent lithium oxide at its Andover discovery.

The West Pilbara region is heating up as WA’s latest lithium hotspot following Azure’s discovery and the stream of intriguing news flowing from Raiden Resources’ adjoining Roebourne project. With plenty of potential on its own tenure, some holes in the ground will help GreenTech firm up whether its newly-discovered pegmatites are lithium-rich enough to make a future mine.

Is your ASX-listed company doing something interesting? Contact: matt.birney@wanews.com.au