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MINING NEWS: Interest up in B.C. uranium claims One Vancouver junior files exploration application, while others jockey for position to exploit historic prospects in province By Rose Ragsdale For Mining News
Unlike its neighbors to the north and east, the western Canadian province of British Columbia is widely regarded as an unlikely place to uncover commercial quantities of uranium.
But that isn’t deterring a small group of companies from organizing exploration of the few known prospects in the province.
The impetus: The global market for uranium has accelerated rapidly in recent years as stores of uranium worldwide have been depleted and prices have climbed. Uranium prices have surged almost fourfold in the past three years.
At least three Vancouver, B.C.-based juniors, International Montoro Resources Inc., newly formed Boss International Gold Corp. and International Ranger Corp. have announced plans this summer to seek commercial uranium deposits in separate ventures in British Columbia. Ranger pursues Foghorn But only International Ranger has applied for an exploration permit, according to Eric Partridge, assistant deputy minister of Mining and Minerals for the B.C. government.
“This is the first company in a long time to express an interest in uranium exploration in British Columbia,” Partridge said in an interview. “We understand that one other company is thinking about it but they haven’t filed an application.”
Partridge said the B.C. government has a lot of geoscience data that indicates there are not a lot of economically viable deposits of uranium in the province.
An intrepid few, however, appear to be undeterred.
In addition to seeking an exploration permit, International Ranger increased its land position in June by optioning about 5,098 acres in the “Sunrise” group of claims, adjacent to its Foghorn Polymetalic project, from a private individual.
A new technical report estimated the Foghorn project’s reserve at 1.56 million tonnes, grading 1.76 pounds of U308 uranium per tonne, or 2.75 million pounds, and 2.3 million tonnes, averaging 21.3 percent CaF2 (fluorite). Montoro goes 'Ballistic' International Montoro said Aug. 3 it has completed a cash and stock purchase of the Go Ballistic and Go Ballistic 2 mineral claims in the Greenwood Mining Division in south-central British Columbia. The 63-acre Ballistic claims are part of the Cup Lake/Donen Group, an historic indicated resource with more than 2.25 million tonnes grading 0.037 percent to yield 839,620 kilograms of uranium.
International Montoro, which owns mining properties in four other Canadian provinces including uranium-rich Saskatchewan, said it is also negotiating acquisition of the remainder of the Cup Lake/Donen Group claims. Boss takes on Blizzard Boss International announced acquisition July 28 of the Blizzard uranium claim in the Greenwood Mining Division in south-central British Columbia and certain surrounding mineral claims in a deal worth $105 million. The company was formed and acquired the Blizzard property in a complex transaction involving Santoy Resources Ltd., Sparton Resources Ltd. and two individuals, Anthony Beruschi and Adam Travis.
The Blizzard claim contains an historic indicated uranium resource. A “basal-type”, hydrogenic paleochannel deposit, Blizzard is estimated to have an indicated resource of 1.9 million tonnes of uranium, grading 0.25 percent to yield 4.73 million kilograms of uranium, according to results reported in 1979.
The property was never placed into production due to a moratorium on exploration and development of uranium resources imposed by the B.C. government in 1980.
By the 1990s, that moratorium had expired. But it took a strong uranium market to ignite new interest in uranium exploration and development in British Columbia.
Boss International has said the Blizzard deposit may be amenable to exploitation by widely used, low environmental impact, in situ solution recovery processes, ISL recovery, involving only minimal surface disturbance.
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