Firebird Metals Limited announced results from Scoping Study to produce manganese concentrate at its flagship Oakover Project. Completion of the Scoping Study follows the recent and significant 170% increase in the Oakover Mineral Resource Estimate (MRE) to 172 Mt @ 9.9% Mn (7% Mn cut-off). The Scoping Study contemplates mining, processing and exporting manganese concentrate from the Oakover Project, which is located 85 km east of Newman in the Eastern Pilbara region of Western Australia.

Access to the Project is via Great Northern Highway, Marble Road and Jigalong Road. Oakover comprises of three granted exploration licenses, with the central license E52/3577 holding the Sixty Sixer, Jay Eye & Karen prospects, which host an MRE of 172.3 Mt @ 9.9% Mn, with 58.7 Mt @ 10.4 % Mn in the Indicated Mineral Resource category and 113.6 Mt at 9.6 % Mn in the Inferred Mineral Resource category. The Scoping Study focusses solely on the Indicated and Inferred Resource at Sixty Sixer.

Both Karen and Jay-eye inferred resources offer significant upside opportunity to convert to Indicated Tonnes and extend Lifeof Mine. The MRE is based on the results from a total of 400 drill holes (20,089.8 m) comprising 391 (19,802.2 m) reverse circulation percussion (RCP) and 9 (287.6 m) diamond drilling (DD) holes completed between 2010and 2021. Drilling, logging and sampling defined six geological domains.

Domains 1, 4 and 6 are background zones comprising the mixed shale, ferruginous manganese shale, shale chert and other shale lithologies. Domains 2, 3 and 5 are mineralised units. Domain 2 is a higher-grade massive manganiferous rich unit, which is reasonably continuous along and across strike, averaging approximately 15 m in thickness.

Manganese grades within Domain 2 range between 10% Mn and 14% Mn. The supergene /lateritic manganese mineralisation is a near surface (Domain 5) unit, with lenticular shale plaquettes and manganese grades up to 28%. The supergene unit averages approximately 5 m in thickness and varies between 1 m and 14 m. This mineralisation has been defined at Sixty Sixer and Karen.

Domain 3 is the lower grade basal manganiferous shale unit, located below the massive manganiferous unit averaging approximately 11 m in thickness with grades ranging between7% Mn and 10% Mn. Firebird is confident of converting further Inferred Tonnes to Indicated Tonnes based on previous infill drilling results. Infill drilling at Jay-Eye and Karen is planned for the second half of 2022.There remains a significant number of exploration targets on the Oakover tenement that require furtherwork and could potentially extend the mine life of the Project.

The recommended mining method is conventional open cut mining using truck and shovel, to focus on the two current economical rock domains (domains 2 and 5), without sterilising the potentially economic Manganiferous Shale rock domain. This is a very common method which allows better targeting of the highest-grade ore and specific rock types, depending on the processing plant throughput requirements and customer contract specifications. The Study considered two processing options, both evaluating a 4,000,000 tonne per annum manganese concentrator including crushing, scrubbing, ore sorting and conventional gravity recovery.

Option 1: Contemplates ore sorting of scrubbed lump material (-50+8mm) with jigging of the fine fraction (-8+1mm) and is considered the base case given historical test work. Option 2: Contemplates crushing to 8mm to and conventional gravity separation. The financial model and Scoping Study is based on Option 1 (ore sorting and jigging combination), however both options deliver a robust financial outcome.

Following further metallurgical testing and modelling during the next stage of development, the optimized flow sheet will be selected. The company looked to incorporate all possible industry learnings into the design and equipment selection to ensure a robust design criteria. Firebird is targeting renewable energy power generation for its processing plant, incorporating solar, wind and battery energy storage system.

The plan includes requirement for a small diesel generator onsite, to facilitate black starts after scheduled maintenance shutdowns or unplanned system shutdowns. The Logistics Study explored the requirements to transport approximately 750,000 to 1,000,000 tonnes per annum of bulk manganese concentrate from the Oakover mine site to Port Hedland export facilities. The Study included identification of the haul route from the mine to the Port of Port Hedland, including the establishment of road ownership (Main Roads WA or Local Government Authority) and confirmation of route approved vehicle and axle mass ratings.

Road ownership was considered to seek, in principle, acceptance of the Accredited Mass Management Scheme level three operations. Furthermore, this included the review of proposed haulage configuration options with the maximum net payload with consideration to Performance Based Standards vehicle assessment framework.