Freeport Resources (TSXV: FRI) has begun the hunt for strategic partners to take its Yandera copper project in Papua New Guinea through feasibility. With the copper price reaching $4 per lb., this may be an opportunity to create a new copper producer.
The company calls this project one of the world’s largest undeveloped copper projects.
An NI 43-101 report prepared by SRK Consulting late in 2016 for Era Resources (a private company) put the total measured and indicated resources at 728.6 million tonnes grading 0.33% copper, 0.01% molybdenum and 0.10 ppm gold. In terms of contained metal, that represents 6.2 million lb. of copper equivalent.
There is also an inferred resource of 230.6 million tonnes grading 0.29% copper, 0.01% molybdenum and 0.04 ppm gold.
The deposit is divided into oxide and non-oxide resources with roughly 90% falling in the non-oxide category.
The Yandera project was subjected to intensive drilling in the late 1960s and 1970s by a number of companies. Later, Era Resources spent over $100 million drilling 144,000 metres so that a resource estimate could be made. Freeport acquired the Yandera project in 2021, when it bought out Carpo, which controlled Era Resources.
The Yandera resource has a known 5-km strike length within a 17-km trend. The depth has been little investigated. Freeport has a plan for expanding the resources and developing an open pit mine. A mine life of at least 20 years is planned during which time a total of 540 million tonnes of ore will be mined.
