New resource estimate for Sunridge Gold’s Asmara deposits in Eritrea

New resource estimates for two of four deposits at Sunridge Gold‘s (SGC-V, SGCNF-O) Asmara project show a significant increase in size, the company says.

A new National Instrument 43-101 resource estimate for the Adi Nefas high-grade zinc-gold-copper volcanogenic massive sulphide deposit, and the copper-gold Debarwa VMS deposit, brings most of the resources in both deposits into the indicated category.

Debarwa has a rich supergene copper zone of 1.3 million tonnes with an average grade of 5.36% copper. Using a 1% copper cut-off it contains158 million lbs of copper in the indicated category.

The deep primary zone at Debarwa, which is open at depth, contains 699,000 tonnes and has an average grade of 2.53% copper with 3.23% zinc in the indicated category using a 1% cut-off. It contains an additional 39 million lbs copper and 49.8 million lbs zinc.

The average grade of the primary zone at the Adi Nefas deposit, meanwhile, which holds 2.7 million tonnes, using a 2% zinc cut-off, has increased to 8.38% zinc, 2.85 gram gold per tonne and 99.36 grams silver per tonne, containing 504 million lbs zinc, 250,000 oz. gold and 9 million oz. silver.

The new estimates bring the total combined metal at Asmara in the indicated category to 2.3 billion lbs. zinc, 1 billion lbs. copper, 872,000 oz. gold and 27 million oz. silver.

“If you add up those numbers it’s worth US$7 billion and our market cap is only roughly shy of C$75 million,” says Greg Davis, Sunridge’s Vancouver-based vice president of business development.

“We’ve only began exploring our properties four years ago and we have numerous high-priority targets yet to go large showings the size of a city block and large gravity anomalies. It’s a very rich property.”

Debarwa is about 30 km south and Adi Nefas is about 8 km north of the capital city of Asmara. Both have road access, power, water and are just 120 km from an international port.

Lundin Mining (LUN-V, LUNCF-O) holds an 18.5% stake in Sunridge.

Davis notes that Eritrea enjoys a favorable mining environment and cites the experiences of Nevsun Mining. Nevsun received its mining license for its high-grade gold, copper and zinc Bisha project in western Eritrea within five years of discovery.

“It’s exceptional to go from initial discovery hole to mining permits in that period of time when you think of all the steps involved,” Davis says. “That’s incredible — you won’t see that in places like Canada or Mexico.”

The mining code is based on the mining code of the Northern Territories of Australia with a royalty of 5% on precious metal, 3% on base metals and a tax rate of 35%, the company says.

Shares of Sunridge on the Toronto Venture Exchange closed up 2 to $1.45 on a trading volume of 136,000.