Commerce Resources reports on Blue River drilling results
Commerce Resources Corp. (TSXv: CCE) (FSE: D7H) (OTCQX: CMRZF) is pleased to announce the completion of a National Instrument NI 43-101compliant Mineral Resource update that incorporates drilling results to the end of 2010 for the Upper Fir Tantalum-Niobium Deposit at Blue River, B.C.
A technical report prepared by independent consultants, AMEC Americas Limited supports the findings of the Mineral Resource update and also includes summaries from the Blue River Preliminary Economic Assessment (PEA) study completed with an effective date of 29 September, 2011 (2011 PEA - see the commerce news release dated November 3, 2011). The results from the 2011 PEA mining studies have not changed in terms of their outcomes as their underlying assumptions remain reasonable.
Highlights:
Study results show Indicated Mineral Resources totalling 51.8 million tonnes at 192 ppm Ta2O5 and 1,490 ppm Nb2O5 and Inferred Mineral Resources totalling 8.8 million tonnes at 186 ppm Ta2O5 and 1,660 ppm Nb2O5.
This represents a 42 per cent increase in the tonnage of indicated resources and a 37 per cent increase in the tonnage of Inferred tonnes over the figures in the 2011 PEA.
Contained kilograms of tantalum increased by 40 per cent in indicated resources and by 23 per cent in Inferred resources, while contained kilograms of niobium increased by 25 per cent in Indicated resources and by 21 per cent in inferred resources. Over 86 per cent of the tantalum and 84 per cent of the niobium reside in the indicated resource category.
The increased tonnage is mostly due to lowering the bulk mining method block unit value cut-off from US$52/t to US$40/t by eliminating backfill costs and, to a lesser extent, additional infill diamond drilling.
AMEC’s “Blue River Tantalum-Niobium Project, British Columbia, Canada, NI 43-101 Technical Report on Mineral Resource Update”, with an effective date 22 June, 2012 will be filed shortly for public disclosure (SEDAR.com) on the date of this news release.
With the significant milestone of this resource update successfully achieved, Commerce and AMEC will continue their work on an update of this new mineral resource estimate to incorporate 34 additional drill holes (totalling 8,715 m) of infill drilling in 2011, as well as the results of ongoing 2012 work.
