Alba Mineral Resources (ALBA ) said it has received the first set of assay results back on bulk sample concentrates produced at its pilot processing plant at the Clogau-St David's Gold Mine.  

This first underground bulk sample was collected from the mine in October 2020 and has now been successfully completed and returned from an accredited independent laboratory. 

While Alba had not anticipated receiving high-grade results from this initial processing exercise, it said the first set of assayed concentrates have returned ‘very notable grades’. 

Specifically, concentrates from the Jack Williams Lode and floor material from Tyn-Y-Cornel area returned notable grades of 20.4 to 165.5 g/t. Alba said it intends to take further bulk samples here during the current phase of underground work activities which are ongoing. 

In particular, Alba said these results are ‘a significant advance’ on the initial processing of a small bulk sample at a third-party processing facility, which was announced on 8 January 2021, and which confirmed the production of a 20.7 grams per tonne gold concentrate. 

Assays from concentrate produced from two other bulk samples, those taken at the Tyn-Y-Cornel South mining area and the Llechfraith Level 2 Pillar, returned lower grade results.  

Alba said the variability of grades is as a result of bulk sample locations in previously worked out areas and the gold distribution at Clogau which is known to be irregularly disseminated.  

Alba explained that further bulk samples due to be taken at Clogau this year will be from new, unworked veins, which have been identified through the Company's own drilling and where the prospects for higher-grade mineralisation are therefore expected to be greater. 

Alba said today’s results confirm that the pilot processing plant is performing well in terms of its ability to extract and concentrate coarse gold. It added that the tailings values which returned negligible gold grades indicate that the pilot is operating with high efficiency. 

Meanwhile, it told investors that both the underground and surface drilling programmes at Clogau-St David's continue to ‘progress well.’ To date, JW003, the third hole in the current phase of surface drilling, has reached a depth of 115 metres while the first hole in the current phase of underground drilling, UG001, has been drilled to 50.5 metres, it noted. 

Alba's Executive Chairman, George Frangeskides said the results are demonstrative of how well the pilot plant is working now in producing gold concentrates with high recoveries. 

“This bodes well for when we move onto bulk sampling new and previously unmined areas, in particular those new zones which we are defining in the course of our ongoing surface and underground drilling, where we believe the prospects for high-grade mineralisation are much greater,” he added. 

View from Vox 

Shares in Alba Mineral Resources have traded sideways over the past two weeks with the shares reacting positively last week to the news of the spin out of assets based in Greenland. The stock was trading 1.73% higher this morning at 0.26p following the news. 

Reasons to ALBA

Alba Mineral Resources is a well-diversified exploration and development company which owns and operates mining projects in Greenland, Wales and Ireland. Its strategy is to identify and secure undervalued assets with a diversified commodity mix where there is potential for discovering further unexploited resources alongside the existing mine site. 

JORC Resources expected at Clogau   

Despite losing field time to the COVID-19 pandemic, Alba said it is in a position to execute one of the most significant underground work programmes seen for several decades at its Clogau gold mine in Wales, just as the commodity is reaching all-time highs in value.       

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