Superior Resources Limited (ASX:SPQ) (Superior, the Company) announces the results of a revised Scoping Study conducted on the Company’s 100%-owned Steam Engine Gold Project, located approximately 210 kilometres west of Townsville, Queensland. The Project is unique, as it is centrally located between a newly recognised large scale porphyry Cu-Au belt and a large-scale magmatic Ni-Cu-PGE sulphide province, both of which are 100%-owned by the Company.
The study has confirmed a financially and technically robust opportunity to develop the Project as a low CAPEX, open pit mining and toll treatment operation and also highlighted robust economics for a standalone on-site processing plant operation, albeit with higher capital cost requirements.
Superior’s Managing Director, Peter Hwang commented:
“In order to progress Steam Engine towards production, a revision of the earlier 2021 scoping study was required, given the sustained higher gold price environment enabling about a A$1,000 per ounce higher price assumption as well as a 60% upgrade to the Mineral Resource since 2021.
“Despite the recent cost escalations that have affected the resources sector and the adoption of a lower production target under the Toll Treatment scenario, the Scoping Study has clearly demonstrated the resilience and financial robustness of the Steam Engine deposit by delivering a 70% increase in the pre-tax NPV of the Project whilst also highlighting the financial viability of a standalone mining and processing scenario.
“We are naturally very pleased with the compelling Scoping Study outcomes, which are quite remarkable considering the increased cost inputs and the reduced level of production on which the study was based. Importantly, the Scoping Study highlights the substantial value escalation that the project can deliver with increasing scale.
“As a result, our current Resource expansion and exploration drilling programs are focussed on extending the Mineral Resource along strike, identifying new lode zones along approximately 10 kilometres of untested mineralised structural corridors and in particular, new high grade lode targets that have been identified by the SAM geophysics. We will also be commencing feasibility study work units alongside the Resource expansion programs.
“We are now confident to progress Steam Engine as a low capex and near-term revenue-generating operation capable of underpinning a greater Greenvale Project copper, gold and nickel development strategy, whilst also testing the large-scale potential of the Project.”
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