QMC Quantum Minerals Corp. (OTC: QMCQF) (TSX.V: QM
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- QMC is quickly advancing toward completion of a NI 43-101 report
- The company expects the NI 43-101 report to test historically reported 1.2 million tons of 1.51 percent Li2O
- Lithium-ion battery forecasts support expectations that electric vehicles will overtake fossil fuel cars and exponentially boost demand for lithium
As a new year dawns, QMC Quantum Minerals Corp. (OTC: QMCQF) (TSX.V: QMC) (FSE: 3LQ) is positioning itself to “reawaken the promise in Manitoba’s historically rich lithium properties” by establishing the commercial lithium-bearing potential of the company’s Irgon Lithium Mine Project for the North American market (http://nnw.fm/E6mPa) and advancing its project toward mining production.
Lithium has occupied the green tech spotlight as a mineral that’s critical to the operation of the lithium-ion batteries that power a wide array of increasingly ubiquitous computer products, including cell phones, laptops and smart watches. The expected ascendance of the electric vehicle industry is adding exclamation marks because of its potential to exponentially increase lithium demand.
While lithium prices have been in decline recently, market analysts have debated the trend’s portent for the future, with many arguing that stock prices are overreacting and that prices should begin to rise again by the beginning of the coming decade. Seeking Alpha’s most recent monthly mining news edition also cited a report that Chinese company Envision Energy’s CEO is predicting that the price of electric vehicle batteries will drop so dramatically that they will “end the reign of the internal-combustion engine” and cause fossil fuel car production to disappear virtually “overnight” as EV prices become cheaper during the next few years (http://nnw.fm/VLk1d).
QMC’s efforts to supply a domestic source of lithium have focused on previously explored but underdeveloped hard rock mineral sites in southern Canada. Historically, North America’s hard rock miners dominated the lithium industry until the 1980s by extracting the white metal from the mineral spodumene, which, as a lithium aluminum inosilicate, is a source of lithium and is often found in large quantities. South American nations hosting the famed “Lithium Triangle” gained market dominance with their more economical lithium brine evaporation ponds as the price of the white metal fell, but companies such as QMC assert that the hard rock mining process is ultimately more reliable and faster to bring into production once the initial exploratory work has been completed.
QMC has invested over two years into its vision for its Manitoba property, known as the Irgon Lithium Mine Project, stating that, typically, hard rock projects take three to five years to commence production. The company is anticipating the completion of an updated NI 43-101 resource report on the Irgon Project, in which it holds a 100 percent undivided interest.
Irgon and several other known pegmatite dikes which host spodumene mineralization are located within the Irgon Property. The total project area encompassed by the 22 claims that comprise the Irgon Mine Project is 11,325 acres. Prior historical exploration at the site produced a resource estimate of 1.2 million tons of Li2O grading 1.51 percent over a strike length of 365 meters and to a depth of 213 meters. QMC expects that its pending resource estimate will identify higher grades, tonnages and strike distances of the dikes than those indicated by the original, historical resource report as a result of the very positive results from the company’s ongoing exploration program.
For more information, visit the company’s website at www.QMCMinerals.com
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