Ariana Resources (AIM: AAU) announced that resources for its Salinbas project in northeastern Turkey increased to 1.5Moz up from c.1Moz that the company previously reported.
In a press release, the miner said the estimate is split between the high-grade Salinbas deposit and the low-grade, high-tonnage Ardala porphyry complex.
According to Ariana, the Salinbas deposit comprises 8.4Mt @ 2.21g/t Au + 16.9 g/t Ag for 0.6Moz gold and 4.6Moz silver, while the Ardala porphyry comprises 66.4Mt @ 0.44g/t Au for 0.9Moz, plus 3.3Moz silver, 110,000t copper and 4,200t molybdenum, which includes a higher grade core of 32.5Mt @ 0.51g/t Au, 0.21% Cu, 0.01% Mo.
The project area is right at the heart of a major copper-gold province
“This new resource estimate represents a major increase in the resource, confirming the project as having multi-million ounce, multi-commodity potential and indicates further growth opportunities,” Kerim Sener, the company’s managing director, said in the press brief. “The prospectivity of this region is attested by the presence of several other major copper-gold systems in the immediate vicinity, such as the >4Moz Hot Maden deposit, located just to the south of our project licences, and the scale of the alteration systems encountered within our property in the vicinity of the porphyry centres at Ardala and Hizarliyayla.”
According to Sener, the project area is right at the heart of a major copper-gold province that -in his view- shows potential for >10Moz across the circa 100-kilometre long and 10-kilometre wide Artvin-Yusufeli Gold Trend.