Western Foreland Copper Project

Zambia

Overview

The geology is dominated by the architectural domains known as the Western Foreland succession and the Lufilian Fold & Thrust Belt. The Western Foreland succession is host to high-grade Kamoa-style mineralisation, while the neighbouring Lufilian Fold & Thrust Belt plays host to lower- grade, bulk tonnage, near-surface mineralisation of the Kolwezi-type. The company believes there is scope for the discovery of both high-grade Kamoa-style mineralisation at depth and lower grade Kolwezi-type mineralisation at, or near-surface.

The licence has received very limited historical exploration to date, and Galileo plan to rapidly advance drill ready targets.

Background

The licences cover ground in the Western Foreland geological district of northwestern Zambia, an emerging copper district, underexplored to date and subject to fresh geological remodelling by the world’s top global exploration companies.

Significant potential exists for the discovery of new, high-grade, high-tonnage, deposits of copper akin to Ivanhoe Mines’ Kamoa-Kakula complex, situated just 100km along strike, over the border in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Ivanhoe Mines continues to make discoveries in the region, with a total of 48Mt of copper discovered since 2008 (Ivanhoe Mine’s 2024 Company Presentation).

Recent exploration at Ivanhoe’s Kitoko deposit discovered copper mineralisation in previously unknown stratigraphic sequences, highlighting the prospectivity of additional stratigraphic units and further widening exploration potential in the whole region (Ivanhoe Mines Kitoko Summary).

In the Western Foreland geological terrane the company is using the Kamoa–Kakula deposit model to explore for copper mineralisation associated with prospective redox fronts in the ancient Western Foreland sedimentary basin architecture.

Here, structural geology and reducing traps play an important role in concentrating circulating mineralising fluids, leading to deposition of copper in stratabound sediments.

Mineralisation at Kamoa is located immediately above the redox boundary at the contact between the oxidised Mwashya Subgroup arenites and the base of the overlying reduced diamictites of the lower Grande Conglomerat, and is capped by the hanging wall Kamoa Pyritic Siltstone-Sandstone unit (Schmandt et al., 2013; Parker et al., 2013).

African Pioneer PLC, which has an interest in four neighbouring licences in the region, recently reported that its partner, First Quantum Minerals exploration, had confirmed the presence of copper mineralisation with diagnostic regional geological and architectural similarities consistent with Kamoa-Kakula type mineralisation.

Joint Venture Agreement

Potential

The company plans to undertake Phase 1 exploration within the period by way of a reconnaissance campaign of mapping, soil geochemistry, geophysics and drilling, building towards discovery and definition of a new Mineral Resource.

If the Phase 1 exploration results are successful and prove the continuity of mineralisation at grades suggesting the potential for the future development of a Mineral Resource of not less than 500,000 tonnes of contained copper, consistent with economic recovery at the depth of discovery with a minimum internal rate of return of not less than 25% and a payback period not exceeding 42 months (including the recovery of capital expenditure), then there will be a second two year exploration period.

The Phase 2 exploration expenditure of US$1.5 million will be funded by Galileo who will be the operator of the Licence for the duration of the Agreement.

Refer to the news announcement of 5 September 2023 for full details of the terms of the Joint Venture Agreement.

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