LONDON, Aug. 9, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Bluejay, the AIM and
FSE listed, and OCTQB (ticker: BLLYF) traded, exploration and
development company with projects in Greenland and Finland, has signed a joint venture agreement
('JV' or the 'Agreement') with KoBold Metals ('KoBold'), at the
Company's Disko-Nuussuaq nickel, copper, cobalt, platinum magmatic
massive sulphide project ('Disko' or the 'Disko Project') in
Central West Greenland.
KoBold
- KoBold's purpose is to discover and develop new ethical sources
of the critical materials for electric vehicles. KoBold's objective
is to make more discoveries of outstanding orebodies by drawing on
world-class expertise in exploration geoscience and by developing
full-stack exploration technology to use machine learning and other
scientific computing techniques to enable highly effective
exploration decision-making
- Principal investors in KoBold include Breakthrough Energy
Ventures, a climate & technology fund, overseen by Bill Gates, and whose investors include
Michael Bloomberg, Jeff Bezos, and Ray
Dalio. Other investors in KoBold include Andreessen
Horowitz, the premier Silicon Valley venture capital fund and
Equinor, the Norwegian state-owned multinational energy
company
- KoBold has been recognised in 2021 as a Technology Pioneer by
the World Economic Forum and as one of the 100 most promising
private artificial intelligence companies in the world by CB
Insights – and the only one within the mining industry
The Agreement
- KoBold will earn 51% of the Disko-Nuussuaq licence holding
through a two stage earn-in commitment
- Stage I: Advanced geological and geophysical evaluation of
Disko-Nuussuaq to refine drill-targets using KoBold's proprietary
technology, $3.4 million sole-funded
by 31 December 2022
- Stage II: Sole funding of either US$11.6
million in drilling expenditure or 15 pre-agreed drill holes
within the Disko licence area by 31 December
2024
- Bluejay can maintain its 49% shareholding by funding its pro-rata
commitment after Stage II
- Bluejay is a well-recognised and respected partner by
communities, stakeholders and regulators in Greenland and will manage field operations
until 2024
- Should KoBold complete Stage I work but not complete the
drilling commitment in Stage II before 31
December 2024, 2.0% of the JV company and thereby control
will revert to Bluejay with both parties subject to continuing
standard dilution methodology
Kurt House, CEO of KoBold,
said: "The Disko region has seen the rare convergence of
events in earth's history that could have resulted in forming a
world-class battery metal deposit.
"KoBold's technology is perfectly suited to discovering new
resources at Disko. Our proprietary library of analytical tools,
Machine Prospector®, will enable effective deployment of
exploration capital and maximize our chances of discovery at
Disko-Nuussuaq.
"We are excited to invest in Greenland's emerging mineral sector and to
partner with Bluejay in light of their strong track record in
Greenland and the outstanding
potential of the Disko project."
Bo Stensgaard, CEO of Bluejay,
said: "This Agreement is transformative for Bluejay. We are
delighted to have a partner at the pinnacle of technical innovation
for new exploration methods, backed by some of the most successful
investors in the world.
"Additionally, Bluejay retains the ability to self-fund to
maintain a 49% ownership through to production, providing external
public investors with the opportunity of investing alongside a
private investment entity of this magnitude.
"Disko is a project with great potential for the discovery of
globally significant deposits of battery metals. It is, however,
this scale that necessitated a financially and technically strong
partner to develop Disko. After many conversations with many groups
from all over the world we are pleased to enter into partnership
with a group that shares our position on fairness and providing a
transparent long-term outcome for shareholders as well as being a
credible and reliable partner that shares our commitment to
environmental sustainability. I am very pleased to say that we have
achieved this now with KoBold, an organisation with the heft and
technical capability to grow this project to its full commercial
potential. We are extremely excited to be working with them."
Dr. Peter Lightfoot,
Lead of Magmatic Systems at KoBold, said: "The
Disko-Nuussuaq Property is centred in a region of extensive
contaminated and metal-depleted volcanic centres where there is
clear evidence for the equilibration of flood basalt magma with
crustal sulfur with potential for the concentration of magmatic
sulphides in shallow sub-volcanic intrusions. The rich inventory of
government and exploration data provides an excellent starting
point for KoBold to utilize proprietary technology to support
exploration."
"After working on the Noril'sk mineral system and applying the
ideas to help Falconbridge with
their exploration work, it is exciting to see this work come to
fruition."
The Disko Project
The Disko Project is hosted within the West Greenland Tertiary
Igneous Province where Bluejay holds several licences that make up
its holding of 2,897 square kilometres ('km²'). In recent
years, the Company has seen a licence acquisition "race" where
Bluejay's first-mover holdings have been surrounded by other
licence holders, most notably Anglo
American which holds almost 10,000 km².
Previous studies and work conducted by the Company highlighted a
strong correlation between the Norilsk massive sulphide emplacement
in Siberia, which is the marginal
producer of nickel and palladium, and Disko. Bluejay has
undertaken multiple work campaigns, undertaking aerial surveys,
extensive geochemical sampling utilising the most modern analytical
techniques with ultra-low sensitivity as well as soil gas
hydrocarbon sampling. These new "deep-penetrating" geochemical and
gas surveys have for the first time provided metal anomaly signals
coincident with previously identified large-scale geophysical
responses.
More than 30 years of exploration by companies, including
Cominco and Falconbridge, but also
more recent work by Vismand Exploration and Cairn Energy backed
Avannaa Resources, as well as government-backed work and data
acquisition by the Geological Survey of Greenland/Geological Survey of Denmark, has resulted in a vast amount of
scientific data (both geological, geochemical and geophysical) all
pointing to globally significant accumulations of
metals.
For further details on the announcement please use the link:
https://polaris.brighterir.com/public/bluejay_mining/news/rns/story/x2gk0nw
For further information please
visit http://www.bluejaymining.com or contact:
Roderick
McIllree
|
Bluejay Mining
plc
|
+44 (0) 20 7907
9314
|
Bo
Stensgaard
|
Bluejay Mining
plc
|
+45 2367
8067
|
Eric
Sondergaard
|
Bluejay Mining
plc
|
+1 403 813
1830
|
Tim Blythe
|
Blytheweigh
|
+44 (0) 20 7138
3205
|
Megan Ray
|
Blytheweigh
|
+44 (0) 20 7138
3205
|
Notes
Bluejay has multiple projects in Greenland and Finland, and has now secured three globally
respected entities as partner, customer, and co-investor on three
of its projects, giving the Company and its shareholders both
portfolio and commodity diversification in high quality
jurisdictions.
Its most advanced project is the Dundas Ilmenite Project in
Greenland, which is fully
permitted and being developed towards production in the near
term. The Dundas Ilmenite Project has been proven to be the
highest-grade mineral sand ilmenite project globally, with a
Mineral Resource reported in accordance with the JORC Code of 117
million tonnes ('Mt') at 6.1% ilmenite and a maiden offshore
Exploration Target of between 300Mt
and 530Mt of ilmenite at an average
expected grade range of 0.4 - 4.8% ilmenite in-situ. The Company
has agreed a Master Distribution Agreement with a major Asian
conglomerate for up-to 340,000ktpa of its anticipated 440,000ktpa
annual output. The Company's strategy is focused on securing
financing ahead of commencing commercial production at Dundas in order to create a company capable of
self-funding exploration on its current and future projects.
Bluejay holds two additional projects in Greenland - the 692sq km Kangerluarsuk
zinc-lead- silver project ('Kangerluarsuk'), where historical work
has recovered grades of 41% zinc, 9.3% lead and 596 g/t silver and
identified four large-scale drill ready targets; and the 2,025 sq
km Thunderstone project which has the potential to host large-scale
base metal and gold deposits. Bluejay also has a joint-venture
agreement with a mining major at Enonkoski in Finland; has recently signed a binding
agreement for a partial divestment in a fourth Finnish project, and
with KoBold at Disko following today's announcement.
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SOURCE Bluejay Mining plc