The resource, which takes in 11 areas, now stands at an indicated and inferred 202.3 million tonnes grading 1.37% nickel and 0.12% cobalt.
The result comes from drilling at the Santa Monica and Big Kahuna deposits. Santa Monica now stands at 75Mt at 1.38% Ni and 0.12% Co and Big Kahuna is 40.4Mt at 1.32% Ni and 0.17% Co.
Weda Bay Minerals was listed on the Alberta Stock Exchange in December 1996 having raised C$9.3 million.
The Halmahera project is held under a Contract of Work between the Indonesian Government and PT Weda Bay Nickel (90% owned by WDA’s wholly-owned Singapore subsidiary and 10% owned by PT Aneka Tambang Tbk).
Weda Bay has a strategic partnership with the OM Group - listed on the New York Stock Exchange – which is the world’s leading producer of value-added, metal-based specialty products.
The large lift in resources has prompted plenty of bullish news out of Canada. The expectation now is that Weda Bay will finalise its bankable feasibility study at the end of next year.
This document is predicted to outline an operation costing between US$450 and US$550 million to develop. Start-up is penciled in for 2004.
Production from the first phase of the operation will be in the order of 45,000t of nickel and 4,000t of cobalt per annum.
