Hudbay Minerals (TSX: HBM; NYSE: HBM) has signed an option agreement with a subsidiary of the Japanese trading company Marubeni covering three projects located within trucking distance to Hudbay’s processing facilities in Flin Flon, Man. Marubeni can earn a 20% interest in the projects by making at least $12 million in exploration expenditures over a period of five years.
When Marubeni successfully completes its earn-in options, a joint venture will be formed to hold the projects with Hudbay, acting as operator, holing an 80% interest.
“This arrangement allows us to partner with Marubeni and leverage our operational and exploration expertise to test our large Flin Flon land package to potentially bring another mine into production and utilize Hudbay’s idle processing infrastructure in Flin Flon. Hudbay has discovered and operated 29 mines in our nearly 100-year history in Manitoba and we have the potential to continue that success with this renewed focus on exploration in Flin Flon,” said Hudbay president and CEO Peter Kukielski.
Masafumi Ichigetsu, GM copper mining at Marubeni, said, “We see tremendous opportunity to partner with Hudbay’s technical expertise and proven track record of successful discovery, development, and operation of many mines in the region.”
The three projects covered by this option are the Cuprus-White Lake, Westarm, and North Star.
The Cuprus-White Lake project is about 10 km southeast of Flin Flon and includes two historic mines. The Curpus mine was active in the early-1950s, mining 463,000 tonnes of ore grading 3.25% copper and 1.3 g/t gold. The White Lake mine produced 850,000 tonnes at grades of 1.98% copper and 0.72 g/t gold over 10 years in the 1980s and 1980s.
The Westarm project is 14 km south of Flin Flon. The region saw production of over 1.4 million tonnes from the 1970s to 1990s with average ore grades of 3.2% copper and 1.38 g/t gold. Historical work includes 210 surface drillholes with only 16% of them reaching depths below 300 metres. Numerous VTEM anomalies are known on the property.
The North Star project is 17 km east of Flin Flon and includes two former producers. The North Star mine produced over 242,000 tonnes with average grades of 6.11% copper and 0.34 g/t gold. The Don Jon mine produced 79,000 tonnes of ore grading 3.98% copper and 0.96 g/t gold. Both mines were active in the 1950s.
Exploration work is to begin this summer with geochemical and mapping programs. A 20,000-metre winter drilling program is planned for 2025.
Hudbay is the third-largest copper producer in Canada. Learn more on www.HudbayMinerals.com.
