Quantum Cobalt shares active on Kahuna and Rabbit Lake results

Quantum Cobalt Corp. [QBOT-CSE; BRVVF-OTC] on Monday announced the results of early stage exploration at the company’s 100%-owned Kahuna and Rabbit Lake Cobalt projects. Both properties are situated in the historic Cobalt, northeast Ontario district, approximately 37 km and 47 km, respectively, south of the Town of Cobalt.

The Kahuna property is comprised of 77 claims, covering about 1,200 hectares. It had already seen some mining activity in the 1920s, yielding about five tonnes of ore, grading 22% cobalt. High-grade silver, assaying 20 oz/ton silver, has also been recorded.

More recently, in 1998, a portion of the property was staked and a small survey reported cobalt-in-soil up to 40 parts per million (ppm) as well as gold-in-soil anomalies. A soil sampling program conducted around an old mine shaft, indicated the existence of several strong anomalies.

The company says cobalt and silver mineralization occurs in calcite veins within a geological structure known as the Nipissing Diabase as erythrite and native silver.

On November 28, Quantum Cobalt shares rallied after the company issued a news release announcing that a visiting crew has completed a first pass exploration program at the Kahuna property, comprised of prospecting, mapping and sampling. The company said 166 soil samples and 28 grab samples were collected and submitted for assay at Acme Laboratories in Timmins, Ont.

In the Monday December 18 news release, the company said 11 of the grab samples reported above 100 parts ppm cobalt. Out of that 11, nine were collected from historic development rock piles at historic workings.

A recent exploration program was also completed on the Rabbit Lake property, where historic work has returned an assay of 8.76% cobalt and 6.56% nickel. The company said 126 soil samples and 29 rock samples were collected and submitted for assay. Peak results in soil samples included 319.9 ppm cobalt and 0.31 g/t gold.

The company plans to follow up on these results with additional field work in the spring of 2018. Prospecting and sampling at Rabbit Lake has focused on the Rabbit Lake Occurrence, a mineral showing that is described in the Ontario Mineral Deposit inventory. It said the work is aimed at defining the existing mineral showing and identifying additional mineralization and favourable geology for follow up testing

The Cobalt region was the site of a silver rush in the early part of the last century with mining continuing into the 1980s; however, the area is currently seeing a renewed interest for the specialty metal cobalt which has been used as a heat resistant alloy for aircraft jet engines. In more recent years, expectation of explosive growth in lithium-ion battery demand has sparked investor interest in a select group of companies in the cobalt exploration space. As cobalt is a key ingredient in the production of lithium-ion batteries used in the electric vehicle industry, demand for the metal is expected to soar along with the expected rise in sales of electric vehicles in the next decade.

Quantum Cobalt shares advanced 1.23% or $0.02 to $1.65 in late morning trading on Monday.