By Panorama Minero
The Piuquenes copper-gold porphyry project covers ~1,880 ha in the San Juan Province, adjacent (to the north) with the Altar copper-gold porphyry project (Aldebaran Resources Inc.) and approximately 190 km west of the city of San Juan. Other large porphyry copper projects in the San Juan Miocene porphyry belt include, El Pachón (Glencore), approximately 30 km to the south, the operating Los Pelambres copper mine (60% Antofagasta plc) in Chile, and Los Azules (McEwen Mining) 50 km to the northeast. Since its discovery, the Piuquenes project has remained privately held.
The first evidence of copper oxides at Piuquenes was reported in 1970 by Compañia MInera Aguilar S.A., who subsequently completed the first exploration program between 1973-1975. Between 1995 and 1997, Inmet Mining Corporation (IMC) completed a heli-magnetic/radiometric survey, surface geology, rock and soil geochemistry, ground magnetics, PD-IP and eight diamond drillholes (P1A to P8A) for a total of 1,894.2m. Subsequently, in 2015-2016, Anglo American Argentina (AAA) completed detailed 1:2,500 geology and geochemistry, 17.8 km of gDAS24 deep 3D PD-IP/NSMT and a 920.2 m diamond drill hole (PIU16-DDH01).
Inmet Mining Corporation (subsequently acquired by First Quantum in 2013) intersected significant copper and gold mineralization including:
• Hole P8A - 413.5 m (from 167 to 580.5 m) @ 0.47% Copper, 0.52 g/t Gold;
• Hole P4 - 67.5 m (from 207 to 274.5 m) @ 0.63% Copper, 0.51 g/t Gold; and
• Hola P2 - 158 m (from 3 to 161 m) @ 0.32% Copper, 0.6 g/t Gold.
In November 2023, Pampa Metals re-logged and assayed the 920.2 m Anglo-American Argentina diamond drill hole which had crossed the mineralized zones intersected by IMC. Results were reported in a news release dated 5 December 2023 as follows:
• Hole PIU16-DDH01 - 558 m @ 0.38% Copper, 0.42 g/t Gold, 2.4 g/t Silver (from 362 to 920m EOH)
• including 296 m @ 0.5 % Copper, 0.5 g/t Gold, 2.7 g/t Silver (from 362 to 658 m)
• including 180 m @ 0.71% Copper, 0.61 g/t Gold, 3.8 g/t Silver (from 362 to 542 m)
• including 130 m @ 0.81% Copper, 0.6 g/t Gold, 4 g/t Silver (from 362 to 492m)
