THIS IS AN ADVERTISING PROMOTION
What if you saw potential others had missed? What if you possessed a once in a lifetime opportunity that others had overlooked? What if you knew something that could change the world? Explorers of old, who ventured off to discover distant lands asked themselves these questions. Fueled by conviction and courage they ventured where others were hesitant to tread. Exploration in the mining world is different in many ways yet similar in all the ways that matter.
World Copper is a Canadian exploration company that embraces these virtues and is prepared to make its mark on the world. The company’s flagship asset, Escalones, in Chile, is rich with intrigue and a unique story that investors will look back on in years to come with great wonder - and that will have major miners around the world asking themselves, what if?
INTRODUCING ESCALONES
Escalones is a property that is no stranger to mining, having been mined as far back as the 1920s, its high grade 12% ore was mined out extensively. With only the low-grade (for the 1920s) ore left, Escalones was left to be ‘discovered’ again, in the mid-1990s. There are three copper porphyries on the claim block, considered a ‘cluster’ of porphyries similar to the largest copper mines in the world, including Escondida in Chile, which alone provides 5% of the world‘s copper.
The project found its way into the hands of TMI (Tri Metals Mining) in the early 2010s, who drilled 53 holes atop the mountain, initially targeting the high-grade copper skarn and then discovering the adjacent large-tonnage porphyry mineralization. It was such a large deposit, they never finished drilling-off their multiple targets. Pausing to review their initial results, they concluded the size and grade of Escalones were not sufficient to justify the investment of billions of pounds in infrastructure to put the project into production as a sulphide flotation mine and the project went dormant.
WHAT IF YOU SAW POTENTIAL OTHERS HAD MISSED?
Escalones was acquired by World Copper in 2019 from TMI for shares. World Copper’s chief geologist recognized that the highest grade of copper was closest to the surface in the oxide layer of the resource and could potentially be processed in a far less expensive manner than TMI had contemplated: heap leaching copper oxide.
TMI relinquished its rights to Escalones for a 30% stake in World Copper. TMI, now Gold Springs, has since sold their stake in World Copper to Wealth Minerals. The chairman of World Copper is the CEO of Wealth Minerals.
WHAT IF YOU POSSESSED A ONCE IN A LIFETIME OPPORTUNITY THAT OTHERS HAD OVERLOOKED?
World Copper geologists performed hundreds of metallurgical tests on drill core samples and outlined an oxide resource that was now Chile’s largest copper oxide project; no small feat in a country known for mega-copper projects. Instead of a potential infrastructure cost of billions of dollars, it‘s reduced to hundreds of millions.
Instead of a tailings-generating sulphide flotation mining operation, a more environmentally friendly heap leach oxide mining operation would be appropriate. For all the right reasons, oxide heap leaching is the best way to produce copper for the world, and provides World Copper with the opportunity to develop the World’s Greenest copper project at Escalones.
WHAT IF YOU KNEW SOMETHING THAT COULD CHANGE THE WORLD?
World Copper’s management is led by CEO Nolan Peterson who has set the company on a path to revolutionize copper mining. World Copper has retained experienced third-party engineers to provide a preliminary economic assessment for the current resource at Escalones, which will be delivered in early Q1 2022. World Copper has outlined an inferred resource of 426 million tonnes of 0.37% oxide copper.
The resource has more potential tonnage, with a higher grade, than three of the largest oxide copper mines currently in production in Chile, held by majors such as Codelco (the world’s largest copper company).
With over 3.4 billion estimated pounds of copper currently in the resource, Escalones is the largest copper oxide project in Chile.
World Copper has answered its ‘What if?’ emphatically. Escalones has evolved in a heartbeat from a copper-sulphide project that would take decades to put into production, to a development project with a clear path to production.
DISCLAIMER: This article was written by World Copper and published by Shares under a commercial agreement. It is not a recommendation to buy or sell the shares. The article originally appeared in Shares’ Spotlight report on 23 December 2021.
