Drilling at the Falcon West property. Credit: Grid Metals.
Grid Metals (TSX: GRDM; US-OTC: MSMGF) has outlined an initial resource that positions the company’s Falcon West property in Manitoba as the world’s second-largest cesium resource actively being developed by Western-based companies.
Falcon West’s Lucy South deposit holds 51,500 tonnes grading 2.58% cesium monoxide (Cs2O) and 1.47% lithium oxide (Li2O) for contained metal of 1,322 tonnes Cs2O and 756 tonnes Li20, Grid Metals said in a statement. Lucy South includes a higher-grade pollucite zone of 15,600 tonnes grading 5.19% Cs₂O and 1.76% Li₂O, containing 811 tonnes of cesium oxide, Grid Metals added.
The high-grade zone at Lucy alone is larger than Power Metals’ (TSXV: PWM) full resource at Case Lake in Ontario, with twice the grade, ATB Cormark mining analyst MacMurray Whale said Thursday in a note. Case Lake has an open pit inferred mineral resource of 13,000 tonnes at 2.4% Cs2O and 1.3% Li2O, Power Metals has said.
The world’s largest resource of the critical metal is also in Canada. It’s PMET Resources’ (TSX: PMET) Shaakichiuwaanaan cesium project in Quebec.
Grid Metals’ initial resource is “a major step forward for this early-stage developer,” Whale said in his note. Since a new round of exploration is being planned this winter around the main zone, “success with further drilling could help establish a larger resource to justify investment in a processing facility,” he added.
Cesium is a rare earth metal that is defined as a critical mineral by the U.S. and Canadian governments. It’s commonly used to help drill oil, and is also used in atomic clocks, photoelectric cells, vacuum tubes and radiation monitoring equipment.
Only three primary cesium mines are believed to have operated historically: Manitoba’s Tanco mine, Bikita in Zimbabwe and Sinclair in Australia. Sinclair’s resources were exhausted in 2019, while Tanco and Bikita are approaching the end of their cesium mine lives, with remaining production coming from tailings and remnant mining.
Lucy South’s entire resource is classified as measured, the highest-confidence category under Canadian mineral resource reporting standards. The deposit starts close to surface, averaging about 20 metres deep, and could be mined using conventional open-pit methods.
Its pollucite zone is enclosed by a thicker cesium-, lithium- and tantalum-enriched core zone occupying the middle portions of the pegmatite, Grid Metals said. The zone remains partly open to the northeast, southeast and southwest.
Joint venture
Located about 130 km east of Winnipeg, Falcon sits half a kilometre north of the Trans-Canada Highway. It’s also close to rail infrastructure and Manitoba’s hydroelectric power grid.
Grid holds an 85% interest in the project and operates the joint venture with Agnico Eagle Mines’ (TSX, NYSE: AEM) Avenir Minerals unit, which owns the remainder.
The resource is based on drilling completed between 2012 and 2026. The pollucite zone covers an area of about 120 metres by 50 metres.
Grid Metals shares were unchanged at 17¢ apiece Thursday afternoon in Toronto, valuing the company at about C$40 million ($28 million). The stock has traded between 9¢ and 18.5¢ in the past year.
