Thermal to test potential of Labrador Trough property

With its Williams Creek copper project entering the feasibility stage, Thermal Exploration (ASE) has turned to the Labrador Trough of northern Quebec for new reserves.

This year, the California-based company will spend $400,000 to carry out exploration over a 174-sq.-km permit area being acquired near Lac Romanet, Que., President Dale Corman told shareholders at a recent annual meeting. Thermal is betting that a large, sediment-hosted copper deposit of the type currently producing in the Central African Copper Belt lies in the dolomites of the Labrador Trough.

The Kowelzi deposits in Zaire, for example, host proven reserves of some 880 million tonnes grading 4.5% copper and 0.4% cobalt. “We’re elephant hunting here,” Corman said.

The Labrador Trough area hosts a number of copper zones, but has not been looked at extensively since the 1960s. The mineralization occurs in dolomite units along a strike length of about 80 km.

Meanwhile, at the Williams Creek deposit in the Yukon, Thermal and partner Western Copper Holdings (VSE) are launching a $300,000 feasibility program in anticipation of production in 1994.

“We may have to go into a pilot leach program to satisfy the banks,” says Corman, who is looking at a number of options to finance Thermal’s 50% share of the $40-million project.

If Williams Creek is given the go-ahead, the mine will be Canada’s first copper producer to use low-cost solvent extraction and electrowinning technology on a full-time basis.

Open-pit reserves stand at 13.6 million tons grading 1.07% copper and 0.014 oz. gold per ton.

At a directors’ meeting held before the annual meeting, Hugh Harbinson was appointed vice-president of corporate development and Charles Page became vice-president of exploration. Corman is chairman, president and chief executive officer.