North Shore Region
The Grenville geological province in Quebec has significant exploration potential for a variety of substances, yet remains largely underexplored.
Azimut focused on this promising region by conducting systematic predictive modeling for copper, uranium and nickel over 500,000 km2 within the framework of three strategic alliances with Kennecott Exploration, a subsidiary of the Rio Tinto Group.
In 2005, Azimut began acquiring many of the targets identified during this regional assessment, which led to the current major portfolio of 18 properties (2,946 claims), including 4 properties for uranium and 14 for nickel.
The rise of uranium prices since 2003 has fuelled renewed interest for uranium in the Grenville, where several ore deposits are already known, including Johan-Beetz Bay (historical resource of 93 Mt at 0.025% U3O8 and 0.025% Y) and the Double S deposit (Uracan Resources - 2008 inferred resource of 74 million tonnes at 0.012% U3O8).
Azimut's target ore deposit type for the North Shore region is a large-tonnage uranium deposit amenable to open-pit mining, like the Rössing deposit in Namibia (150,000 t U at 0.03% U3O8).
Since 2005, expenditures for Azimut's partner-funded exploration programs on its North Shore properties have totalled $1.8 million. Azimut is actively seeking new ventures with partners on these properties.
Key results for Uranium
North Havre
Click for map, photos and other information on Arianne Resources website.- Surface prospecting revealed a mineralized subhorizontally dipping pegmatite with an average thickness of 5 m
- The showing correlates well with a strong 1 by 5 km helicopter-borne uranium anomaly
- Rock samples grade up to 0.43% U3O8 and more than 4% in rare earth elements; also contain high values in gallium, yttrium, niobium and zirconium
Grenium (strategic alliance with Kennecott/Rio Tinto)
- High uranium contents in lake-bottom sediments, with peak values up to 1,310 ppm U
- Several strong kilometre-scale airborne radiometric anomalies identified
- Several radioactive zones discovered by follow-up surface prospecting: grab samples yield up to 0.33% U3O