The area of interest is in the region known as Rio Zamora, 90 km southeast of Cuenca.
Corriente can earn a 70% interest in the project by issuing 1.8 million units of Corriente and completing a feasibility study. Each unit consists of one share and one share purchase warrant.
Lowell Mineral Exploration can earn up to 10% of Corriente’s interest by managing exploration over the next three years. In the first year of the agreement, Corriente will issue 350,000 units and spend at least US$1.5 million on exploration. Billiton retains a back-in right for 70% by providing production financing.
“Billiton discovered a whole new porphyry district, with at least six separate copper systems, at Rio Zamora,” explains David Lowell, president of Lowell Mineral Exploration. “Three of these systems have some widely spaced drilling, two of which — the San Carlos and Panantza systems — have inferred sulphide resources.”
He adds: “There is reason to hope that significant higher-grade secondary enrichment may be present in areas not yet drilled, such as the Warintza and Sutzu prospects.”
The 880-sq.-km land package is in a remote area near the Peruvian border. Mineralization is hosted in Jurassic-aged volcanic rocks. A first phase of drilling is planned for the Warintza prospect, where high-grade chalcocite is evident at surface. The company has encountered grades as high as 1.3% copper in channel samples within a copper-in-soil anomaly measuring 1.5 km by 3 km.
Corriente also plans to drill the San Carlos prospect, where Billiton has already put down 25 holes totalling 5,900 metres. The British company estimates that the target contains an inferred resource of more than 1 billion tonnes grading 0.4% copper, or 400 million tonnes grading 0.7% copper. The prospect still has potential for surface oxide mineralization.
Corriente says it could be drilling at San Carlos by the second half of the year. At Panantza, Billiton drilled 11 holes totalling 2,900 metres, whereas, at the Sutzu prospect, it defined a copper-in-soil anomaly covering several square kilometres coincident with porphyry-style alteration.
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