The Montepuez Project 8770C Mining License comprises an area covering 3,666.88ha and is held 100% by Battery Minerals Limited (Metals of Africa Limited prior to December 2016) via a locally owned subsidiary Suni Resources SA.
On April 3, 2023, Tirupati Graphite plc completed the acquisition of Suni Resources SA.
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Summary:
The Montepuez Graphite Project is located within the Xixano Complex and traverses the tectonic contacts between the Nairoto, Xixano and Montepuez Complexes. The Xixano Complex includes a variety of metasupracrustal rocks enveloping predominantly mafic igneous rocks and granulites that form the core of a regional north-northeast to south-southwest trending synform. Graphite-bearing mica schist and gneiss are found in the Xixano Complex. Locally, graphitic schists occur with dolerites, meta-sediments, amphibolites and minor intrusions of cross-cutting pegmatite veins. Graphite forms as a result of high-grade metamorphism of organic carbonaceous matter and vanadiumbearing minerals such as roscoelite occur as secondary minerals.
The 8770C license occurs on the Xixano Complex and traverse the tectonic contacts between the Nairoto, Xixano and Montepuez Complexes. The Xixano Complex includes a variety of metasupracrustal rocks enveloping predominantly mafic igneous rocks and granulites that form the core of a regional north-northeast to south-southwest-trending synform. The paragneisses include mica gneiss and schist, quartzfeldspar gneiss, metasandstone, quartzite and marble.
The metamorphic grade in the paragneiss is dominantly amphibolite facies, although granulitefacies rocks occur locally in the region. The oldest dated rock in the Xixano Complex is a weakly deformed meta-rhyolite which is interlayed in the meta-supracrustal rocks and which gives a reliable extrusion age of 818 +/-10 Ma.
Graphite-bearing mica schist and gneiss are found in different tectonic complexes in the Cabo Delgado Province of Mozambique.
Local geology comprises dolerite, meta-sediments, amphibolites, psammite with graphitic metasediments and graphitic schists.
At Elephant deposit the metamorphic banding and foliation strike about 005° and the GSQF dips moderately steep west.
At Buffalo the deformation strained zone of GSQF, psammite and amphibolite exhibit brittle and brittle-ductile structures that intersect eachother, the deformation zone is where graphite mineralisation is located and part of a regional metamorphic and deformation event.
The Montepuez deposits are disseminated with graphite dispersed within gneiss. The graphite forms as a result of high grade metamorphism of organic carbonaceous matter, the protolith in which the graphite has formed may have been globular carbon, composite flakes, homogenous flakes or crystalline graphite.
The geology at Buffalo is complex and comprises a syncline, with the majority of the graphitic schist package occurring on the eastern limb; bound by amphibolite. The drilling is angled toward the east and is likely to be 70 to 90% of true width.
The geology at Elephant is less structurally complex than Buffalo and comprises a moderately steep westerly graphitic schist package bound by amphibolite and notable psammite in the southern portion of the orebody.
The Buffalo Mineral Resource area extends over a north-south strike length of 900m (from 8,585,065mN – 8,585,965mN), has a maximum width of 295m (470,855mE – 471,150mE) and includes the 280m vertical interval from 410mRL to 130mRL.
The Elephant Mineral Resource area extends over a south southwest-north northeast strike length of 2.4km (from 8,583,970mN – 8,586,330mN), has a maximum width of 255m (469,055mE – 469,310mE) and includes the 180m vertical interval from 400mRL to 220mRL.
Production
Test work has been conducted to demonstrate that V2O5 can be extracted as a by-product of graphite processing at the Project. Tailings from the graphite plant will undergo a secondary process that involves further grinding to liberate Vanadium minerals (predominantly roscoelite) and a two stage magnetic separation process with stage 1 removing high iron gangue and stage 2 recovering the Vanadiumto the magnetic fraction. The Vanadium rich magnetic fraction recovered from the magnetic recovery circuit contains approximately 75% of the Vanadiumin the graphite plant tailings. This material, upgraded to approximately 1.3% V2O5, will form the feed to a standard roast and leach process to recover the Vanadium content as a V2O5 product.
| Commodity | Units | Avg. Annual |
|
Graphite
|
kt
| 50 |
All production numbers are expressed as concentrate.