A travel log of South America

Exploration Insights spent an eventful past couple of weeks in South America with a few site visits intermixed with a conference in Santiago de Chile.

At the Latin Rocks Chile Explore Group Congress 2023 conference, I presented an update on the copper market from a near and longer-term perspective, (Fig. 1).

In my presentation, I underscored the potential for market deficits in the copper industry after 2026 if the growth driven by carbon-neutral technologies continues as forecast. However, in the near term, the spectre of a global economic slowdown is weighing on industrial metals, including copper, (Fig. 2).

In addition to my presentation, I had the pleasure of serving as one of the four judges on a panel evaluating several copper and precious metal explorers.

To wrap it up, I conducted another edition of the Capital Markets for Geoscientists short course alongside Nicole Adshead-Bell of Cupel Advisory, Michael Gray, MSc (Economic Geology) of Agentis Capital , and Dale Mah of Endeavour Silver Corp , (Fig. 3). Moreover, the trip provided the opportunity to reconnect with colleagues I hadn’t seen before the COVID-19 pandemic.?

My first site visit was to the pre-feasibility-stage Vizcachitas copper-molybdenum-silver project in Chile operated by Los Andes Copper Ltd. Vizcachitas is a large open pit project (136 kt/d) located at a low elevation (1,950 masl) in a narrow valley near San Felipe, a few hours from Santiago, (Fig. 4).

In my opinion, the concerns over a global economic slowdown have generated a near-term negative sentiment to copper development projects such as Vizcachitas, therefore its search to secure the required funding of US$2.44 billion for its construction will be challenged. In the long term, this size of project may be required given all the delays in the development of projects in other jurisdictions such as the USA.

Technically, the project also needs to mitigate its impact on downstream farms' water resources by building an underground canal. Los Andes will source its water from a proposed coastal desalination plant.

The PFS also includes a dry-stacked tailings facility that is a constraint on the life of the mine but is required due to the combination of the steep topography, high seismicity and the critical nature of water conservation in the narrow valley, (Fig. 5).

Lastly, I spent several days in the jungles of Peru near the town of Tingo María, (Fig. 6), where rivers run eastward toward the Amazon basin, assessing grassroots porphyry copper and epithermal precious metal prospects held by Hannan Metals Ltd . ?The carbonate hills behind the town make for a picturesque backdrop.

However, the challenging terrain and conditions under the hot and humid conditions with a few snakes, (Fig. 7), reminded me of working in Ecuador in the late 1990s. I also recalled having something lay eggs in my big toe in southern Brazil around the same time.

As such, I am not a fan of the Jungle but the unbiased nature of the weekly newsletter forces me to treat all environments equally and without prejudice.

As the reward tends to be positively correlated with the work required, we found boulders in creeks containing porphyry-style alteration with chalcopyrite, bornite, molybdenum, and roscoelite, a vanadium-bearing mica mineral, (Fig. 8), linked to the highest gold grades at Barrick 's Porgera project in Papua New Guinea, which could be back in production before the end of the year.

In the coming weeks, I will share a more comprehensive review of this 3-day visit with Exploration Insights subscribers in the coming weeks. If you are curious, please check out the website before considering signing up, (link here).

Once I got back I provided a comprehensive review of the royalty and streaming sector for Rick Rule 's Royalty & Streaming Bootcamp for resource sector investors, (link here).

I am back in Vancouver now and looking forward to my final trip of the year to Whitehorse for the Yukon Geoscience Forum and Trade Show supported by the Yukon Chamber of Mines .