As one of the world’s most attractive uranium plays, Canada’s Athabasca Basin is attracting significant mining investment, particularly for new development spending.
Located to the south of Lake Athabasca, the Athabasca Basin covers approximately 100,00km2 in Saskatchewan, and a small portion of Alberta.
It is best known as the world’s leading source of high-grade uranium, currently supplying just over 20% globally.
Uranium in Saskatchewan was discovered in 1934 at Beaverlodge in the northwest corner of the province and produced uranium from underground mines from 1952 to 1982.
The north-eastern Athabasca Basin has an extensive history of uranium exploration, discovery, and development. This region is host to many significant uranium occurrences and includes one of the two currently operating uranium mines in Saskatchewan (Cameco’s Cigar Lake) along with a mill (Orano’s McClean Lake mill).
New excitement
The Basin’s status as a major global uranium producer is not about to slow down, with new discoveries made and future developments hitting milestones in recent months.
Marvel Discovery
Marvel Discovery Corp. (TSXV: MARV) recently confirmed it had intersected anomalous radiation in every hole in its now completed inaugural diamond drilling programme at the DD and Highway Zone within the KLR-Walker Uranium Project in the Athabasca Basin.
A total of 1,343m was completed through six diamond drill holes. Two holes were completed at the Highway Zone and four holes were completed at the DD Zone. The average length of the drill holes was 224m.
“Anomalous CPS values were encountered in every hole with impressive downhole peak probe values. We look forward to receiving assays along this favourable structurally related uranium trend, a key ingredient to the large uranium deposits of the Athabasca Basin.” President and CEO, Karim Rayani, said.
Purepoint on target
In early May, Purepoint Uranium Group Inc. (TSXV: PTU) reported promising results from its drill programme at the Hook Lake Joint Venture at the Carter Corridor in the Athabasca Basin.
“Our latest exploration drill hole on the Carter Corridor, CRT23-05, has uncovered a significant 35m wide boron halo surrounding a 0.08% U3O8 uranium intercept over 0.4m,” said Scott Frostad, VP of exploration at Purepoint.
“This discovery of boron associated with uranium in the Carter Corridor is particularly exciting, as boron is a key pathfinder element for uranium deposits. Our neighbouring basement-hosted Spitfire uranium discovery also displayed significant boron enrichment that was recognized during its discovery phase.”
The discovery of uranium deposits in the Athabasca Basin using boron as a pathfinder was first made at the Key Lake deposit in the late 1970s by a joint venture between Uranerz Exploration and Mining, Saskatchewan Mining Development Corporation, and Eldorado Nuclear, and is one of the largest and highest-grade uranium deposits in the world. Boron enrichment is prominent in the sandstone column above the McArthur River uranium deposit, the world’s largest high-grade uranium deposit.
The Millennium deposit, a basement hosted deposit, was discovered in 2000 by Cameco Corporation and partners, that was aided by using boron geochemistry as a vectoring tool. The recognition of the extent of the sandstone and basement alteration combined with anomalous uranium and boron chemistry was key in prioritising the southern portion of the B1 conductive trend, which ultimately led to this discovery.
T92 raises A$2.8M to drill Athabasca Basin Uranium projects
Terra Uranium Limited (ASX: T92) has successfully raised capital to support recently completed detailed exploration to define multiple high-quality drill targets on our Parker and Pasfield Lake projects in the Athabasca Basin.
The projects are considered to have high uranium discovery potential and are characterized as robust, coincidentally stacked anomalies. Coincident geophysical anomalies include strong ZTEM basement conductors, ANT velocity low at the unconformity, a basement magnetic susceptibility low, and strong VTEM conductivity in sandstone considered indicative of potential mineralization at the target basal unconformity. These are supported by uranium and very high helium values in shallow reverse circulation (RC) drilling.
Preparation for diamond drilling is complete with necessary consumables having been brought in over the winter trails, and ice roads for our maiden drilling programme and the Winter Camp Base Camp at Pasfield Lake being transitioned to summer operations.
Funds raised under the FTS placement will be applied to advance exploration and drilling at the company’s uranium projects in the eastern Athabasca Basin, including diamond drilling at priority targets, prospecting, ground geophysics, drill logging, assaying, and eligible staffing expenses, and sundry exploration costs.
Cosa to fly airborne geophysical surveys at Ursa
Cosa Resources Corp. (CSE: COSA) has engaged Expert Geophysics Limited to conduct airborne mobile surveys at its 100% owned Ursa and Orion uranium projects in the Athabasca Basin.
Key Highlights
- Magnetotelluric (MT) survey method capable of detecting basement electromagnetic (EM) conductors and anomalous resistivity zones in the sandstone
- Planned surveying totals 2,900 line-km to provide property-wide coverage at Ursa and Orion
- Modern geophysical dataset will facilitate identification and prioritization of target areas for follow up
“Cosa’s first pass work at the Ursa and Orion projects demonstrates our commitment to efficiently and effectively exploring these for the next major uranium deposit. We are eager to see the results of this survey and work towards drill testing.” President and CEO, Keith Bodnarchuk, said.
VP of exploration, Andy Carmichael, commented “Ursa and Orion contain nearly 75km of combined strike length of highly underexplored magnetic lows hosting EM conductors. With such a large area to explore, mobile MT results will evaluate prospective corridors in their entirety to identify and prioritize key areas for follow-up.”
CanAlaska discovers unconformity uranium mineralization West McArthur
CanAlaska Uranium Ltd. (TSXV: CVV) hit mineralization in multiple holes in a recently completed winter 2023 drilling programme at its West McArthur project.
The drill programme was highlighted by hole WMA079 that intersected 2.3m at 0.58 %eU3O8 and 3.9m at 1.39 %eU3O8, including 0.5m at 7.16 %eU3O8.
During the programme, uranium mineralization was intersected in six of the nine drill holes completed with step out drill fences 100 and 160m northeast of the original basement-hosted discovery, and includes the first ever intersection of unconformity-associated uranium mineralization at Pike Zone. The mineralization drilled to date at Pike Zone remains open in all directions.
“The Pike Zone discovery continues to grow in size as we complete further drilling indicating the potential for this to be a major discovery for CanAlaska and the West McArthur joint venture,” CEO, Cory Belyk, said.
“With a majority of the holes drilled in 2023 encountering mineralization at the unconformity and within basement over considerable and continuous length, the Pike Zone is displaying the critical characteristics of major mineralizing events commonly observed in the Athabasca setting.
“The Pike Zone is open in all directions and the next phase of drilling scheduled for later in the year will focus on expansion of the known mineralization. I remain very encouraged by the continuity of the mineralization and associated intense alteration as well as the new targets that have been identified from this programme for our immediate follow-up,” Belyk said.
