Huntoon Mine Area Cooperation Agreement

Great Western Mining Corp. plc

23 January 2024

 

GREAT WESTERN MINING CORPORATION PLC

("Great Western", "GWM" or the "Company")

HUNTOON MINE AREA COOPERATION AGREEMENT

Great Western Mining Corporation PLC (AIM - GWMO, Euronext Growth - 8GW), which is exploring and developing gold, silver and copper targets in Nevada, announces the signing of a new agreement with Crowne Point Gold & Silver LLC ("Crowne Point") for cooperation in exploring the western part of the Huntoon Valley (the "Agreement"). 

The Agreement novates a previous cooperation agreement with Crowne Point, signed in 2016 but now expired, under which a single hole, CPGW_1, was drilled, intercepting both copper and gold.  The Agreement has been negotiated primarily to build on Great Western's recent progress in establishing the copper potential of its West Huntoon claims.

HIGHLIGHTS

·    Early drilling on private land will attempt to prove up a copper porphyry

·    Access to existing infrastructure

·    Potential for both copper and precious metals

·    Great Western to focus on copper potential, Crowne Point on precious metals

Great Western has recently staked and registered an additional 19 claims in the West Huntoon Valley and now holds 126 full and 12 fractional claims which form part of the Company's larger Huntoon Copper Project area, where a copper resource has already been reported at M2.  Crowne Point owns patented land equivalent in area to six standard claims (the "Six Claims") and which is surrounded by  Great Western claims. The Six Claims include the historic and abandoned Huntoon gold mine, together with a comprehensive network of access roads.  Under the Agreement, Great Western will have access to the Six Claims and in return will assign a 50% interest in nine of its unpatented claims to Crowne Point.  The surface rights on the Six Claims belong to Crowne Point and the Agreement will enable Great Western to drill on and from them without the requirement to obtain regulatory approval which could otherwise cause long delays. Initial drilling will be aimed at proving up the copper porphyry potential of the West Huntoon area which Great Western identified during its productive 2023 field programme, as already announced to shareholders.

Each party will plan its own exploration activity and bear its own exploration cost unless a decision is made to explore on a joint basis.  The Agreement includes the following provisions:

·    Copper or other base metal discovered by Great Western on the Six Claims will be owned in equal shares and gold or precious metals discovered by Crowne Point will be shared 70% by Crowne Point and 30% by Great Western. 

·    Any minerals discovered by Great Western on its own claims through angled drilling from the Six Claims will belong exclusively to Great Western except where the drilling targets  shared claims, in which case the benefits of any discovery may be shared equally between the parties subject to Crowne retroactively reimbursing Great Western for 50% of the direct costs of drilling the discovery.

·    Any value extracted from pre-existing mining waste present on Crowne Point's existing claims will belong exclusively to Crowne.

Great Western Chairman Brian Hall commented: "We have successfully cooperated with Crowne Pointe in the past and are very pleased to have entered into this new cooperation arrangement with them. The flexibility to carry out initial drilling on private land, which will circumvent a potentially lengthy permitting process, will enable us to fast-track our work in defining what we consider may be a significant new copper porphyry in the Walker Lane trend of Nevada.  We are actively seeking a joint venture partner to help finance this programme and currently working on several positive leads."

For further information:

Great Western Mining Corporation PLC
Brian Hall, Chairman	[phone]
Max Williams, Finance Director	[phone]
Davy (NOMAD, Euronext Growth Listing Sponsor & Joint Broker) Brian Garrahy	[phone]
SP Angel Corporate Finance LLP (Joint Broker) Ewan Leggat/Harry Davies-Ball	[phone]
Walbrook PR (PR advisers) Nick Rome	[phone]

Notes to Editors

The Company has a large tract of acreage in Mineral County, Nevada. The acreage partly consists of rugged, mountainous terrain, large parts of which remain under-explored. Mineral potential is hosted by the regional Walker Lane Structural Belt, the largest structural and metallogenic belt in Nevada, yet one of the least explored in recent times, with gold, silver and copper currently produced in Mineral County.  Great Western has seven distinct concession areas which offer the potential for exploiting (1) short term gold and silver deposits and (2) long-term, world-class copper deposits. 

Six of the Company's properties are in the west of Mineral County and are 100% owned and operated.  The Company has an option to acquire a seventh property, the Olympic Gold Project, in the east of the county.  Great Western's small exploration team is supported by locally based consultants and contractors. 

The state of Nevada was rated the world's most mining friendly jurisdictions by the Fraser Institute of Canada in 2023.  While tightly regulated and environmentally conscious, Nevada welcomes the mining industry.  Great Western takes care to ensure that its claims are maintained in good standing and all regulations observed. 

There are numerous gold and silver prospects on the Company's acreage, including extensive historic mine workings which offer the opportunity for secondary recovery. As well as mineral exploration and appraisal, he Company is a 50% participant in the Western Milling LLC joint venture which has now completed construction of a mill to process pre-mined material for secondary recovery of gold and silver.  The mill is currently waiting on a state environmental permit to enable commissioning and first production of precious metal concentrates.

Through extensive drilling over a five-year period, GWM has established a Mineral Resource on its M2 target area in the Black Mountains group of claims.  4.3 million tonnes at 0.45% copper are reported, being 19,000 tonnes of contained copper metal. This resource has been independently reported in accordance with JORC guidelines. 

GWM has also established an Inferred Resource Estimate of 31,000 tonnes grading 1.6 g/t gold and 3.0 g/t silver in tailings associated with the OMCO Mine at the Olympic Gold Project.  Additionally, exploration targets have been independently reported as follows:

·    3,400 - 6,400 tonnes grading between 0.5 and 1.2 g/t Au and 1.2 and 2.1 g/t Ag in the substrate beneath the tailings volume at the Olympic Mine.

·    9,000 - 12,000 tonnes grading between 0.9 and 2.4 g/t Au and 2.0 and 5.1 g/t Ag in a coarse stockpile at Olympic Mine.

·    4,200 - 7,700 tonnes grading between 40 and 140 g/t Ag and 0.3 and 0.3 g/t Au in spoil heaps at Mineral Jackpot.

 

END