Black clouds with a silver (PGE) lining?
posted on
Sep 03, 2009 09:43AM
NI 43-101 Update (September 2012): 11.1 Mt @ 1.68% Ni, 0.87% Cu, 0.89 gpt Pt and 3.09 gpt Pd and 0.18 gpt Au (Proven & Probable Reserves) / 8.9 Mt @ 1.10% Ni, 1.14% Cu, 1.16 gpt Pt and 3.49 gpt Pd and 0.30 gpt Au (Inferred Resource)
Hey gang- I have been reading many of the posts over the last few weeks and followed with interest the arguments for whether chromite has been appropriately factored into the current share price or not. My personal opinion is that the chromite is WAY undervalued at this stage- but that is neither here nor there as far as this discussion is concerned. So as we all anxiously wait for nickel results- I'm hoping for a bigger prize.
Something that was commented on after the luncheon but I do not recall alot of discussion on this board about was the relative amount of airtime given to the Blackbird projects for a project that is merely secondary at this point. They have also been harshly criticized (by some) for the cost and extent extent of drilling needed to create a chromite resource estimate- yet they continued undeterred and even started thinking about what would be needed to improve the efficiency of its extraction. I wondered whether there is something else (besides an obviously valuable resource) here that would keep them focussed on the chromite?
Then I started re-reading HOOV's July 14, 2009 [09:17AM] post regarding the association of PGEs and chromite and tried also to digest Mungall's PNAS article on the long-appreciated but fairly poorly understood association between chromite and PGE precipitation.
That research then brought me to the link below. http://11ips.laurentian.ca/NR/rdonlyres/6259D1E4-0885-40FC-B1B6-3E099365D505/0/11IPS_FirstCircular_Final_Compressed.pdf
It is a reference to an international PGE exploration conference in Sudbury (June 2010)at which Jim Mungall will be hosting two interesting workshops. The first is a one day workshop on the Association between Chromite and PGEs. The second one is a post-meeting field trip to the Noront McFaulds Lakecamp to view "tens of Kms of core" pulled from the Blackbird project. Now- why would you bring some of the world's leading PGE experts to the Noront camp unless there was something about those cores that they would find "academically" notable.
It is my humble opinion that there have been alot more PGE analyses carried out on these samples than have been reported and that they may be making some progress toward identifying areas of rich PGE deposits associated with the chromite mineralization. Remember the central theme of these types of conferences is to improve strategies for finding economic PGE deposits.
I do not pretend to be a geologist - I'm a physiologist actually. But I do plan international meetings for some of the world's leading scientists in my field. All I can say is that I would not invite a group of immunologists to my research lab to see my theories about the generation of a heart attack unless I was sure the immune system playing a very important role in the process.
All IMHO of course. GLTA
Scott