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The Sintoukola Potash prospect is situated on the coastal plain of the Republic of Congo (ROC) in West Africa. Sylvinite and Carnallite mineralisation was initially discovered in the 1930’s during oil exploration and studied in more detail in the 1960’s when 16 holes were drilled in the permit area to determine the extent and type of mineralisation. Historically potash has been mined in the ROC with the Holle mine situated 70 kilometres to the south east of the project operating from 1968 to 1977 during which time approximately 7.5 million tonnes of potash was mined and 2.4 million tonnes of potash concentrate exported.

Republic of Congo

The Republic of Congo (ROC) is situated on the western edge of the African Continent and borders the countries of Angola (Cabina Province), The Democratic Republic of the Congo, The Central African Republic and Gabon. It has a total land area of 342,000 km² and a population of approximately 4.0 million people of which 45.9% are less than 14 years of age and an estimated 83% are literate (CIA World Fact Book).

The ROC was a former French colony which was granted independence in 1960, from 1960 to 1990 the country was effectively Marxist led though a democratically elected government took office in 1992. Since then the country has been the subject of several civil wars which finally ended with the signing of a peace accord between the government and the southern based rebels in 2003.

Oil is the predominant export of the ROC with oil production expected to be in the region of 300,000 bpd in 2009 which will increase to 360,000 bpd in 2010 with the development of the Moho Bilondo field. Oil accounts for 70% of the ROC’s GDP (USD 9.1 billion), 81% of its fiscal revenues and 91% of its total exports. The ROC government wants to diversify away from reliance of oil and has recently agreed to investments of USD 3.0 billion by ENI (Italian Petroleum Company) in biofuels and USD 1.2 billion by Mag Industries (MAA -TSX-V) to develop the 600,000 tpa Kouilou Potash Mine.

Figure 1 Location of Sintoukola Potash License

The Project

The Sintoukola Potash project is situated in a geological environment commonly referred to as the Congo Basin which stretches from Gabon to Angola on the western seaboard of Africa. The Congo Basin was formed during the separation of Africa and South America during the breakup of Gondwana land. The resulting evaporite formations which are thought to have occurred through the evaporation of sea water in a shallow marine environment are estimated to be up to 900 metres thick and include known deposits of Sylvinite and Carnallite.

Figure 2 – Possible Formation of Evaporite Deposits

Exploration activities by a French exploration company (FRCP) in the 1960’s and 70’s identified several Sylvinite and Caranallite prospects which are contained within a 1,436 sq km exploration license held by Sintoukola Potash S.A. Sintoukola Potash is a ROC registered company whose major shareholder and operator is Elemental Minerals Limited with a shareholding of 93%, the remaining shareholders are Les Establissements Congolais MGM (5%) and Tanaka Resources (Proprietary) Ltd. (2%).

Figure 3 – Exploration License

Geology

The project area is overlain by a Pliocene to Pleistocene layer of up to 50m of unconsolidated and alternating clay and sand beds. The clays and sand are deeply weathered and partly unconsolidated medium to coarse-grained ferruginous sandstone. The ferruginous sandstone formation consists of layers of relatively coarse grained sandstones, with local iron concretions and separated by layers of plastic red clay strata. Occasionally, thin discontinuous lenses of gravel are observed. In the top of this series, phosphate horizons can be present. The unconformable contact of this series to the overlying clays and sand suggests that the region has been tectonically active and that locally the phosphate horizons have been removed through erosion.

Below the sandstones occurs an interbedded unit of mudstone and dolomitic siltstone referred to as the Grey-Blue Claystone Formation. It consists of grey-blue to grey-green claystones to siltstones and fine-grained sandstones with a dolomitic cement and some layers/lenses of limestone.

Figure 4 Sintoukola Stratigraphic Column

A massive dolomitic limestone unit underlies the dolomitic siltstone. The dolomitic Limestone Formation, which consists of several kinds of more or less dolomitised limestones with some layers of marl and sand. The contact to the overlying strata, the grey-blue claystones, is gradational. The base of this unit marks a significant facies transition and change in the depositional conditions.

The dolomitic limestone rests on a narrow (5 to 10m) thick anhydrite unit (Anhydrite Formation) which marks the top of a thick evaporitic sequence. The Anhydrite Formation (Serie Anhydritique), which consists of alternating anhydrite and marls of up to 5m thickness. The anhydrite is variable in appearance varying from nodular, brecciated, or laminated to massive. The marls are blue-grey to black and are locally very clay rich. The anhydrite unit forms a gradational transition to the underlying evaporate sequence.

The evaporite sequence (Serie Salifere) is divided in up to eleven thin to thick depositional cycles. Each of these cycles consists of several alternations of the sequence rock salt, carnallitite and sometimes with layers rich in bischofite (MgCl2 X 6 H20) and/or tachyhydrite (CaMg2C1. x 12 H20). The sequence measures on average 600m with a range from 400 to 900m.

The evaporate sequence unconformably overlies reduced facies sandstones of the Cocobeach Formation (Serie du Cocobeach). This contact marks the transition from a rift environment to a marine hypersaline environment.

Figure 5 – Sintoukola – Kola Cross-Section

Historical data from previous exploration activities in the project area were reviewed by CSA Global an international geological consulting company with offices in Perth, Western Australia and Dublin, Ireland. CSA Global have concluded that Sintoukola is prospective for both Sylvinite and Carnallite mineralisation and have estimated that the Kola prospect, which surrounds hole K6 shown in Figure 2 above, could contain between 170 and 300 million tonnes of Sylvinite grading between 23.1 and 23.5% K₂O. CSA have also identified that below the Sylvinite mineralisation situated at a depth of 275 metres lie between 3 and 4 lenses of Carnallite mineralisation of unkown grade.

About Potash

World Resources and Production

Potash is a term used to describe potassium minerals. Potassium along with phosphorous and nitrogen is one of the three essential nutrients required by all plants and animals to grow and which have no substitutes. Potash production in 2008 was estimated to be 36 million tonnes of which 23 million tonnes was produced by Canada (11 million tonnes), Russia (6.9 million tonnes) and Belarus (5.1 million tonnes).

95% of all Potash produced is used as fertiliser and with the increasing global population which is expected to reach 9.0 billion by 2050, demand for potash is expected to grow at a rate of 2-3% per year which will require the development of at least one mine each year with a capacity of over 600,000 tonnes.

The majority of the worlds Potash reserves which is estimated to be 8.3 billion tonnes is made up of Sylvinite and Carnallitite ores. Sylvinite which contains Sylvite (KCl), Salt(NaCl) and other insoluble’s generally contains between 20-25% K₂O, K₂O is the commonly used standard to express the purity of potassium minerals with pure KCl having a K₂O content of 61.3%. Carnallitite which contains Carnallite (KMgCL₃), Water (H₂O), Salt (NaCl) and other insolubles generally contains between 12-16% K₂O due to the presence of magnesium.

The majority of Potash resources are situated in the northern hemisphere with Canada, Russia, Belarus, China, Germany, Israel and Jordon containing 80% of the world’s total resource. Apart from the resources contained within salt lakes such as the Dead Sea (Israel and Jordon) and the Great Salt Lake (Utah USA) the majority of the worlds Potash deposits are situated at depths of greater than 1,500 metres making these projects expensive to develop.

Mining of Potash

Room and Pillar Underground Mining

Since potash deposits are generally tabular and horizontal, the room and pillar mining method is the most common underground mining method used to extract potash. Ore can be mined by either continuous miners utilising between 2 and 4 rotary heads when the potash seam is sufficiently thick and continuous to warrant the initial capital expense or by semi continuous (drill and blast) methods. In potash seams which are variable and often faulted, drill and blast is the preferred method as it is highly effective in managing variable seam thickness’s though its operating cost are higher than that of continuous mining.

Solution Mining

Solution mining is generally used when underground mines are deep and irregular or have been flooded in the past due to geological occurrences eg: earthquakes, or previous mining operations.

In solution mining heated brine (salt and water solution) is injected into the mine through a series of wells and extracted from separate wells where it is pumped to an evaporation pond or directly to a plant.

Solution mining of sylvinite ore generally involves the drilling of a series of wells to form the number compartments which will be eventually extracted. Two wells are drilled per compartment approximately 80 metres apart. Connection of the wells is generally done via one of two methods, either warm water is pumped into the salt layers below the sylvinite layer until a connection is made between the wells, this connection is then expanded to form a compartment or high pressure water is pumped down the well at a pressure of 1,450 psi and the salt formation fractured. Once the compartment is completed the sylvinite layer is mined out from the bottom up by dissolving of sylvinite and salt in a brine solution with the cyclic injection and withdrawal of an oil blanket being used to limit vertical advance. Selective mining of sylvinite can occur if the brine solution used in the wells is saturated with NaCl which significantly reduces the amount of NaCl otherwise dissolved.

Processing of Potash Ores

There are three primary types of processing of Potash ore which are summarised as:

Flotation:

Flotation can only be used for Sylvinite ores, Sylvite (KCl) is hydrophobic and will therefore attach itself to air bubbles in a flotation plant from which it can be separated from the gangue material. The flotation process has advantages over hot leaching and crystallisation as it is not as energy intensive and has a lower capital cost.

Thermal Dissolution-crystallisation (Hot Leaching):

This process is based on the fact that potassium chloride (KCl) has a higher crystallisation temperature than sodium chloride (NaCl). The ground and scrubbed ore is heated to dissolve the KCl and some of the NaCl it is then cooled to a temperature where the KCl crystallises thus separating itself from the NaCl which remains in solution in the brine. The KCl is then separated from the brine and the brine returned to the milling circuit. (note if Solution Mining is used, the need for dissolving the Sylvinite is negated)

Electrostatic Separation:

Electrostatic separation is possible because potash minerals are not naturally conductive and can only be used where gangue minerals are conductive

Downloads:

Download Sintoukola Potash Presentation Sintoukola Potash Presentation.pdf (6.01 MB)

Download Patersons Securities Research Note on Elemental Minerals Ltd  Research Note.pdf (697.42 KB)

Download Commodity Stocks - Elemental Minerals Directors Interview Interview.pdf (151.45 KB)

2010 Sintoukola Project Photos Sintoukola Project Photos 2010.pdf (733.93 KB)

Download Article in Australian Article.pdf (75.06 KB)

Download Exploration Convention  Click Here (1.40 MB)

Download Exploration License Decree Click Here (560.13 KB)

Download Government Gazette of Decree Click Here (200.30 KB)