JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – Aim-listed Bushveld Minerals expected to complete a maiden mineral resource estimate on its vanadium-rich AB zone, in Limpopo, following the receipt of initial assay results next month, the company said on Wednesday.

The zone’s current drilling programme, which started in November last year, involved the drilling of four boreholes to depths of 100 m and 200 m, three of which had already been completed, with the drilling of the fourth borehole under way.

“We are pleased with the progress made on the Bushveld vanadium project since launching that platform less than three months ago and continue to target a maiden mineral resource estimate for the AB zone,” Bushveld CEO Fortune Mojapelo commented.

He added that the vanadium market study had also recently been commissioned and would, in conjunction with the grades evidenced by the company’s testwork on the main magnetite layer (MML) deposit, enable Bushveld to identify an optimum processing route.

“The existence of operational plants processing the MML layer on the Bushveld Complex provides useful precedents to choose from,” Mojapelo said.

Meanwhile, work continued at the Bushveld P-Q deposit, in Limpopo, in pursuit of the prefeasibility study, including the commissioning of the joint metallurgical testwork programme under the company’s memorandum of understanding with China Railway and Engineering Company, he said.

The testwork was being undertaken by Beijing Huamao Lineng Technology.

“The positive results of the metallurgical testwork, combined with the resource modelling under way, provide an encouraging base from which to evaluate the economics of the phosphate project and the extent to which this enhances the overall economics of the P-Q deposit,” Mojapelo pointed out.

He further stated that owing to administrative delays by the regulators in executing the amended prospecting right for the extension of the prospecting area under Bushveld’s licence, it was yet to release the resource upgrade planned for the P-Q project.

“We remain confident that the geological basis for the resource upgrade remains intact and that the amended right, which has been granted, will be executed in the near future. We will proceed with the resource upgrade, as intended, thereafter," Mojapelo said.