JULY 19, 2002

ENCOURAGING RESULTS FROM PRELIMINARY ORE FLOTATION TESTS AT TERTIARY'S GHURAYYAH TANTALUM PROJECT

··Optimisation Expected To Improve Both Recovery And Grade
· Results Indicate Coarser Grind Of Ore May Also Be Possible
· Assays Awaited From Sampling Of Additional Pegmatites At Rosendal

AIM-listed Tertiary Minerals plc says that encouraging results have been returned from preliminary mineralogical and metallurgical tests on ore samples from its Ghurayyah project in Saudi Arabia, reported to be the world's largest single deposit of tantalum. Tertiary holds a five-year exclusive exploration licence over Ghurayyah.

In its end-June quarterly the company reports that a 50-fold upgrade of tantalum and niobium levels at acceptable recovery levels was achieved by conventional flotation and magnetic separation. Optimisation of process parameters is expected significantly to improve on both grades and recoveries, it adds.

The programme of characterisation and mineral processing testwork on samples from archived Ghurayyah drill core is being undertaken by Lakefield Research laboratories in Canada with input from Tertiary's consulting metallurgist, St Barbara Consulting of the UK.

Tertiary says that the major part of the planned testwork remains to be completed but the programme is on target and initial results are encouraging. Work to date has concentrated on the processing characteristics of the Ghurayyah mineralisation and has included gravity, magnetic and flotation separation.

It also included mineralogical examination of the ore to identify the tantalum and niobium bearing minerals. Significantly, testwork has suggested these minerals might be liberated from the rock at a more favourable, coarser grind size than was initially expected.

The results of preliminary tests using the industry-standard flotation technique suggest that commercially acceptable recoveries if tantalum and niobium may be achieved using this technique, says Tertiary. Magnetic separation was used to remove most of the contained zircon from the flotation concentrate to give a preliminary concentrate grading approximately 13p.c. combined niobium and tantalum.

The Ghurayyah deposit contains an estimated Inferred Mineral Resource of 385m tonnes grading 245g/t tantalum pentoxide, 2,840g/t niobium pentoxide and 8,915g/t zirconium oxide. It is amenable to low-cost open pit mining and is characterised by a remarkable consistency of grade and distribution of mineralisation.

Meanwhile, the results of the Phase 1 drilling carried out as part of the pre-feasibility study on the company's other tantalum project, the more modest-scale Rosendal property in Finland, were released during the quarter. The objective of this programme was to infill and extend the tantalum mineralised pegmatite previously explored by the Geological Survey of Finland (GTK).

The outcome was to raise the weighted average grade of drill intersections to 346g/t tantalum pentoxide, 77p.c. higher than the equivalent grade from previous GTK drilling. Tertiary believes this increase, at least in part, reflects the collection and assaying of larger drill samples compared with those of the earlier GTK programme.

The Tertiary programme also extended the drill-tested strike length of the main Rosendal pegmatite to 500m from 200m. It remains open along strike in both directions and at depth. The results of the Phase 1 drilling and prospecting will now be included in a revised resource estimate as part of the development pre-feasibility study.

During the quarter, Tertiary also mapped a number of additional pegmatite dykes at Rosendal. These range from 1m to 13m in width and some contain visible tantalum mineralisation. A sampling programme to assess the additional resource potential has been completed and assay results are awaited.

Elsewhere, Tertiary is planning a four hole diamond drilling programme as an initial test of the Gallujavri prospect in the Finnmark district of northern Finland and is currently awaiting various access permissions and clearances. This is a platinum group metals prospect associated with a zone of outcropping low-grade nickel-copper mineralisation where previous sampling returned values of 2.5g/t platinum, palladium and gold.

Further Information: Patrick Cheetham, Tertiary Minerals Plc. Tel: 01625-626203.
Ron Marshman/John Greenhalgh, City of London PR Ltd. Tel: 020-7628-5518