Robust announces significant progress on Romang Island project
Tuesday, June 12 2012 - 06:52 AM WIB
Australia-listed firm Robust Resources Limited said on Tuesday it has made significant progress in the evaluation of economic alternatives for the Lakuwahi oxide and polymetalic sulphide projects on Romang Island, in the eastern part of Indonesia.
The company said in a statement that during March and April of 2012, a total of 432 meters of HQ diamond drill core from 12 holes were completed across the resource areas for the purposes of conducting metallurgical tests.
A selection of the 432 samples, which are considered to be representative of mineralization from the upper gold-silver rich oxide and transition zones, has been dispatched to Perth , Western Australia, for a comprehensive series of column leach tests, the company said.
Positive results from the column leach tests will be an important step for the company as it progresses towards production on Romang Island , and is the main remaining block of information required to complete a scoping study on the oxide project.
Elsewhere, Robust announced that on March 13 gravity beneficiation of the polymetallic sulphide mineralization has been demonstrated in laboratory testwork. Copper, lead, zinc, gold and silver were shown to upgrade by factors of 2 to 4 times, with high recoveries into approximately a third of the original mass.
Ongoing flotation testwork on the beneficiated sinks and fines have proven that saleable concentrates can be produced from Romang ores. In this test program, suitable activator and collector chemicals were used to ensure good recoveries to concentrate, which was a very important milestone for the Company.
In summary, the flotation tests produced the followings: 80% Pb recovery to 60% concentrate; 80% Zn recovery to 50% concentrate; and 35% Cu recovery to 8% Cu.
The company is continuing with further flotation testing and mineralogy to improve the copper result.
?Robust is carrying out a dual-focused program of work on our exciting mineral discovery on Romang Island,? said Robust Managing Director, Gary Lewis ?Firstly, the company is focusing on aggressive exploration programs to extend known mineral deposits and make new discoveries, aimed at significantly increasing our JORC mineral resource of 1.18 million ounces gold equivalent1 and 1.47 billion pounds of combined base metals2.?
?Secondly, we aim to work through the development options for both the oxide and sulphide projects in order to commercialize our discovery in the shortest reasonable timeframe,? he added.
Editing by Reiner Simanjuntak