Japan Oil, Gas and Metals National Corporation (JOGMEC), a state-owned company, has launched its second joint venture for uranium exploration in northern Saskatchewan, Canada in four months.
The latest jv is for two claims totalling 64km2 in Wolverine-Marten area, in the eastern part of the Athabasca Basin. JOGMEC will take a 50% stake by funding C$2m over four years. Its partner is Vancouver, Canada-based Pitchstone Exploration Ltd.
“Although uranium occurrences have not been identified on the properties yet, there is a good possibility to detect mineralization through future geophysical surveys and drilling,” a JOGMEC statement said.
In November, JOGMEC signed a jv deal for 18 claims totalling 764km2 in Border Block area, in the western part of the Athabasca Basin. JOGMEC will again take a 50% stake by funding C$6m over four years. By spending a further C$6m, the company has gained exclusive marketing rights of mineral products. Its partner is Canada’s Titan Uranium Inc. JOGMEC said that Titan has already carried out electromagnetic surveys suggesting ‘numerous anomalies, several of which are interpreted to be basement graphitic horizons.’ The JV plans to carry out a drilling survey and continue geophysics research.
Since 2007, JOGMEC has had a joint exploration partnership with Titan on the Virgin Trend Project in the centre of the Athabasca basin, with 44 tenements totalling 1,620km2.
In December 2008, JOGMEC signed a jv deal with Australian firm Bondi Mining Ltd to explore eight mining areas totalling 8050km2 in the Murphy area in the northeast of Australia’s Northern Territory. It will pay A$3m for a 51% stake in the project. JOGMEC said that it was ‘optimistic’ about the area, because the Murphy area is recognized to be situated on a westward extension of the mineralized belt which hosts the Westmoreland deposit, which has 20,000t estimated reserves of U3O8.
JOGMEC is a state-owned corporation. It provides grants to Japanese companies that do uranium exploration. JOGMEC also does exploration in areas where there is potential of uranium deposits, ‘but exploration activity is not active due to technical reasons or the investment environment.’ It has received grants from the Japanese government to fund the exploration.
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