Aussie firm buys Karibib lithium mines

DIVERSIFIED resources company Black Fire Minerals has snapped up the Karibib Lithium Pegmatite Project from Australian private company Sunrise Minerals in a deal worth about 455 000 Australian dollars.

The acquisition will be facilitated via Black Fire purchasing Sunrise’s private Namibian subsidiary Starting Right Investments 94, which is the holder of the Karibib lithium Exclusive Prospecting Licences EPL 3750 and EPL 3751.The Karibib lithium project, located 120 kilometres northwest of Windhoek, covers 765 square kilometres of the Karibib pegmatite field.The project tenure includes the historic Rubikon, Helicon and Fricke’s lithium, tantalum and cesium mines which operated intermittently from 1930 to 1994.’Historic mine production data is poorly recorded, but the Rubikon mine reportedly produced some 17 000 tons of lithium mineral concentrates from small scale open-pit and underground mining between 1980 and 1994,’ said Black Fire Minerals in a statement Thursday. Black Fire intends to immediately commence an ‘aggressive exploration programme’ to test drill the known significant strike extensions of the Rubikon and Helicon pegmatites and to assess the potential of the remainder of the two EPL areas for new lithium pegmatite discoveries.The purchase agreement is conditional upon regulatory approvals to be satisfied within 30 days.Final consideration for the transaction will be 3,5 million fully paid ordinary shares in Black Fire, with these shares being subject to a voluntary six-month escrow period.At the company’s closing share price on November 11 2009 of 13 Australian cents, this equates to an acquisition cost of 455 000 Australian dollars.The share price now stands at 14c, following the release of the announcement.Lithium is an extremely soft, silvery-grey metallic element since it is extremely reactive to heat and it is used in components and in batteries. Salts of lithium are used as mood altering drugs.Black Fire Managing Director Simon Rigby said the Karibib Project had not been subjected to modern exploration and the historic lithium mining activities were largely small-scale gouging operations that only exploited small portions of the outcropping pegmatites.’This provides a significant opportunity for Black Fire to carry out drilling programmes and utilise modern regional exploration techniques to assess the entire project area,’ Rigby said.He said the acquisition of Karibib also represented an excellent opportunity for the company to participate in the rapidly growing sector of the energy storage business due to the proliferation of electric vehicles and electronic equipment using Li-ion batteries.’The company intends to advance both Karibib and the previously announced Mystique Gold Project through technically focused exploration activities over the next six months,’ Mr Rigby said.’With the recent successful completion of a significant capital raising, the company is well positioned to fund the current projects and maintain the search for further high quality projects for potential joint venture or acquisition.’