The Araguaia Nickel Project |
Video of Araguaia Drilling |
Introduction
The Araguaia Nickel Project is an advanced nickel laterite exploration / evaluation project located in the Araguaia Fold Belt in the northern state of Para in Brazil, which is a significant new nickel province serviced by good infrastructure. The project is the amalgamation of adjacent grassroots discoveries by Horizonte, Teck Resources and Lara Exploration Limited / Falconbridge Limited(Xstrata). The nickel laterites have developed over the peridotite components of mafic / ultramafic complexes within the belt. Several significant nickel laterite deposits occur within this region of Brazil including Xstrata’s Serra do Tapa/Vale dos Sonhos deposits (Inferred Minerals Resource of 73Mt grading 1.50% nickel – 2006) that are also located within the Araguaia Fold Belt 80km to the north of the project area (Figure 1). 
Figure1: Location and regional setting
What are Nickel Laterites?
Nickel laterites are the residual products of the chemical weathering of peridotites with a primary nickel content of 0.2% to 0.4% in tropical and sub-tropical climatic zones. The laterisation processes concentrate by factors of 3 – 30 times the nickel and cobalt contents of the parent rock.
Project History
The Araguaia Nickel Project as it is today is the result of parallel exploration programmes undertaking in adjacent areas:
In August 2010 in an agreement with Teck Resources, Horizonte Minerals acquired 100% of the licences previously explored in the Teck Resources Araguaia Project.
In July 2011 in an agreement with Lara Exploration Limited, Horizonte Minerals acquired 100% of the licences containing the Vila Oito West and Floresta nickel laterites. The consolidated holdings and laterite targets are shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2: Principal Laterite Targets
Mineral Resource
In March 2011 Horizonte announced a NI 43-101 compliant Inferred Mineral Resource of 76.6 million tonnes grading 1.35% nickel and 0.06% cobalt at Araguaia. Integral to the listing of the company on the TSX in June 2011 a technical report "Geology and Mineral Resources of the Araguaia Nickel Project, Brazil NI 43-101 Technical Report" by Marc-Antoine Audet, James Hogg and Owen Mihalop dated May 15, 2011, was filed on SEDAR (www.sedar.com). Further information in respect of the Inferred Mineral Resources on the Araguaia Nickel Project including, assumptions, parameters and methods used to estimate such mineral resources is included in the Technical Report.
Recent work and results
Horizonte commenced a core drilling programme at Araguaia in October 2010. The most recent drill programme results on 121 holes totalling 2795.97 metres have been released and are available in the news section of our site(see press release 12 September, 2011). The focus has been to complete infill drilling on the Pequizeiro and Baião targets to support revised resource estimate targeting the Indicated Mineral Resource category. Results of this drilling programme are reported regularly as results become available. A resource upgrade at Araguaia is anticipated for the fourth quarter of 2011.
The production of a digital terrain model (DTM) with 2m contours has been contracted to Viasat Geo Technologies, Montreal for support of the resource update.
A preliminary economic assessment together with process comparison and process option trade off studies were initiated in Q3 2011, focussing initially on pyrometallurgical and heap leach processing solutions.
