Projects
West Pilbara
Andover Lithium
GreenTech Metals (ASX:GRE) and Artemis Resources (ASX:ARV) executed a binding incorporated joint venture agreement in March 2025 which combined the lithium mineral rights to their respective extensive tenement packages in the West Pilbara. The lithium mineral rights have been combined to form a lithium exploration company called Andover Lithium Pty Ltd (Andover Lithium) with GreenTech and Artemis each owning 50% of the shares of Andover Lithium Pty Ltd.
The company’s Pilbara Lithium Projects, including the Ruth Well project tenements and the Osborne JV with Artemis Resources Ltd (GRE-51%:ARV-49%), continue to be held as prospective assets. GreenTech believes in the prospectivity of these tenements for lithium pegmatites and the longer-term value of these lithium based assets. The Andover Lithium Pty Ltd joint venture with Artemis Resources, established to consolidate lithium mineral rights, remains a key strategic vehicle to attract a major funding partner for the extensive lithium exploration tenement package.
Location and Tenure
Andover Lithium creates a 420km2 lithium exploration land package which incorporates a significant portion of the highly prospective West Pilbara lithium corridor. The combined tenement package is centred 25km west of the Azure Minerals’ 60% owned world class lithium pegmatite discovery with a reported exploration target of 100 – 240Mt @ 1.0 – 1.5% Li2O. SQM and Hancock acquired Azure Minerals for $1.7B, implying a $2.8B valuation of the lithium pegmatite discovery1.
Prospectivity
Within the Area of the Joint Venture there are already 5 known prospective lithium areas with spodumene bearing pegmatite identified at 4 of these areas. Majority of these recently discovered pegmatites are characterised by quartz-feldspar-mica mineralisation with visible spodumene commonly observed. These prospects are known as:
Kobe Trend
Reconnaissance rock chip sampling conducted in 2023 confirmed the presence of a high-grade lithium pegmatite trend (Kobe Trend) with assays returning up to 1.8% Li2O and with mineralisation confirmed as spodumene. The pegmatite bearing zone is up to 200m wide and with individual pegmatites up to 6m in width. Within the pegmatite bearing zone individual steeply dipping pegmatites of variable width up to 4m are observed. The Kobe pegmatite has only been drill tested at two localities and to depths of 80m. Both holes revealed the pegmatite to be representative of the mapped surface expressions. The Kobe pegmatite trend has been traced for 7.5km along strike and remains open.
Test work carried out by Curtin University by way of X-ray Diffraction (XRD) analysis on samples of the Kobe pegmatite have confirmed that the lithium bearing mineral is spodumene.
Kobe West Trend
Kobe West represents the extreme western extension of the Kobe trend where a south westerly lithium soil trend has been defined with a strike of 700m and a width of 200m. Peak soil assays exceed 200ppm Li2O. An ASX announcement by Accelerate Resources (AX8) who hold the adjoining tenement reported strong lithium-caesium soil anomalism within their tenements located between the Kobe – Kobe West trend demonstrating that this lithium mineralised trend has a combined strike of at least 9.5km. Subsequent drill testing by Accelerate identified lithium bearing pegmatite up to 50 true thickness.
Kobe South Trend
The Kobe South lithium soil trend is southeast trending over a strike of 5.5km and varies in width from 300m up to 1km. The trend appears to stop in the northwest while in the southeast it is truncated by the tenement boundary. Although there is strong and persistent lithium soil anomalism, there have been no at surface exposures pegmatite identified suggesting that the pegmatite trend may be recessive or poorly exposed. Kobe South is considered to likely represent a western extension to the Osborne cluster which is exposed at surface and located 3.4km to the east within the Osborne tenement E47/3719. This prospect has not been drilled.
Southern Trend (Osborne JV)
The Osborne group of pegmatites comprises the Wally, Maddox and Osborne trends and is defined by a large associated anomalous lithium soil footprint which has a strike of ~4km and a width of up to 1.3km.
Reconnaissance rock chip sampling has confirmed the prospectivity of this pegmatite cluster with high grade assays returning up to 3.6% Li2O. The anomalous soil footprint eclipses the size of the observed pegmatite outcrop and indicates there is potentially more to be discovered at Osborne. Mineralisation has been confirmed as spodumene. Surface rock chip sampling indicates that the Osborne pegmatite trend is the most prospective pegmatite within the Southern trend and is yet to be drill tested at depth.
Mt Marie
The lithium pegmatite discovery at Mt Marie presents as a prominent outcrop with dimensions of 25m x 150m and occurs along a mirrored or similar NE structural trend to the pegmatite swarm discovered by Azure Minerals only 20km to the east. The pegmatite intrudes mafic & ultramafic units like the type of host rocks observed at the Azure lithium discovery in outcrops at the newly discovered Mt Marie prospect. Initial rock chip samples from the Mt Marie prospect were tested for mineralogy type at Curtin University and the analysis confirmed that the host mineral for the lithium is spodumene. The follow up exploration program confirmed larger and coarser spodumene crystals than previously identified (figure 6) which provides a level of confidence as to the grade and scale of this discovery. In this area the spodumene crystals may represent up to 40% of the bulk rock fabric and range between 3cm to 10cm in length. However, the maximum spodumene crystal length is reported up to 30cm. Rock chip assay results have reported up to 4.67% Li2O.
The Company has approved programs of work (PoW’s) and all heritage clearances have been completed which will facilitate future drill programs on the project tenements.
Ruth Well Nickel
The Osborne Nickel prospect, which is located 5km northeast of the Sholl B1 nickel-copper deposit, is a discrete VTEM anomaly that coincides with the contact between mafic and ultramafic intrusions of the Andover Intrusive Complex. Osborne is subject to a joint venture with ASX listed Artemis Resources (ASX:ARV) with Greentech earning a 51% interest. The target is modelled as dipping 30 – 45 deg to the north with the top of the target at a depth of around 155 -175m.
Prospectivity
Regional work by Legend was limited to carrying out several airborne VTEM surveys followed up by 12 ground EM surveys and some limited geochemical sampling. This work generated 10 priority targets requiring drill testing. Three targets, Paton, Hickmott and Osborne, lie within the Osborne JV project area.
The most significant work to have been completed in the Ruth Well project area was by Westfield NL between 1969 and 1975, Titan Resources NL (Titan) between 1989 and 2002, Fox Resources NL (Fox) between 2004 and 2015, and Artemis Resources in 2018. These companies carried out a series of open hole percussion, RAB, RC and diamond drilling programs totalling 463 drill holes for a combined 21,750m.
In addition, Titan completed a TEMPEST AEM survey in 2000 and Fox completed an airborne VTEM HEM survey in 2006. These surveys provided coverage over the broader Ruth Well project area, however given the high base frequency utilised (25 Hz) these surveys were unable to resolve highly conductive EM targets amongst broader, more extensive stratigraphic/formational conductive units. Fox completed a ground-based SQUID EM survey in 2007.
This exploration cumulated in the identification of Ni-Cu resource comprising 0.265Mt @ 0.5% Ni and 0.4% Cu. The Ruth Well nickel-copper deposit w discovered by Whim Creek Consolidated NL (Whim Creek) in 1971. Mineralisation comprises violaritised pentlandite, pyrrhotite, gersdorffite, niccolite, chalcopyrite, and magnetite within serpentinised extrusive peridotite of the Ruth Well Formation. This association suggests that the deposits are of a similar type to the extrusive Kambalda nickel deposits of the eastern Yilgarn Craton. The mineralisation however probably lies within a tectonic slice of the Andover Intrusion that has been faulted into the Ruth Well Formation of the Roebourne Group on the northern side of the major, approximately 300 kilometres long Sholl Shear Zone.
Footnotes
- Refer to AX8 ASX Announcement – 2 July 2024 ↩︎