The Mukai Copper Project covers 55.4 sq. km. and is located 125km west of Solwezi in the north-western Province of Zambia. Geologically it is located in the Domes Region of the Central African Copperbelt and it encompasses Lower Roan Subgroup rocks, which are part of the southern flank of the highly prospective Kabompo Dome.
Located Near Large Mines and Major Exploration Projects
The licence is directly adjacent to First Quantum Minerals’ (“FQM”) Trident Project, which includes the recently opened 35 million tonne Enterprise Nickel Mine and the 894 million tonne Sentinel (Kalumbila) Copper Mine, located 8km south and 18km southeast of the licence, respectively.
FQM has invested US$2.1 billion in the Sentinel Copper Mine where the plant has the capacity to treat 55 million tonnes of ore per annum.
Enterprise is a sediment-hosted nickel-sulphide deposit with a total measured and indicated resource of 40 million tonnes of ore containing 431,000 tonnes of nickel, from which FQM envisages processing some 4 million tonnes of nickel ore per year, making Enterprise the largest nickel mine in Africa.
The Mukai Project is also located just to the west of Arc Minerals’ project area on the opposite flank of the Kabompo Dome, where Anglo American can earn a 70% interest from Arc Minerals through expenditure of US$88.5 million, including US$14.5 in cash payments.
First Quantum Minerals Technical Cooperation Agreement
Tertiary has secured a technical cooperation agreement with FQM over the Mukai Copper Project, which allows Tertiary to benefit from FQM’s historic exploration data in the area, as well as FQM’s geological team’s extensive experience and understanding of the area’s geology. Further details can be found in the news release of 15 September 2022.
Tertiary’s Exploration Programme
Tertiary has completed an initial soil sampling programme that has defined a substantial high-grade copper-in-soil anomaly which stretches to our property boundary and into FQM’s adjacent property, where FQM have drilled 23 meters at 0.6% copper and 11 meters at 0.15% copper at the Tirosa Copper Prospect. The soil anomaly at Tirosa is lower-grade than that seen at Mukai.
YouTube video below - Geologist, Humphrey Mbasela, ground truthing at Tertiary Minerals’ Mukai Copper Project, Zambia - September 2023.
A total of 526 samples were collected on a 300m x 100m grid infilled up to 100m x 50m and analysed in the field using a portable XRF instrument (“pXRF”).
A large high-grade copper-in-soil anomaly is defined with values in excess of a 160ppm copper over an area of approximately 1,300m by 400m with a peak soil value of 1,660ppm copper (0.16%) and soil values averaging 252ppm (average of 63 samples).
This high-grade anomaly is part of broader copper-in-soil anomaly defined by 162 samples containing greater than 80ppm copper and averaging 173ppm copper over an area of approximately 1,800m by 800m.
Soil anomalies from past producing mines on the Copperbelt typically have thresholds in the range 50 to 150ppm copper, averaging 80ppm copper and peak values in the range 100-450ppm copper and averaging 210ppm copper.
What’s Next?
Tertiary is finalising the soil sampling programme across its portfolio of Zambian copper projects and will then rank the targets generated ahead of drill testing the anomalies it has defined.
