Nautilus to enter TSX Venture backdoor

Kalgoorlie, Western Australia — Nautilus Minerals, a company seeking to mine high-grade volcanogenic massive sulphide smokers on the seabed of the northern and western Pacific Ocean, could be back-doored into a petroleum company on the TSX Venture Exchange.

An information bulletin making its way around the recent Diggers & Dealers Forum in Kalgoorlie said the goal is to have Nautilus Minerals listed on the Venture exchange by November, and on London’s Alternative Investment Market (AIM) board by April 2006.

Nautilus will appoint well-known geoscientist Geoff Loudon as its chairman. Loudon is a director of Lihir Gold (LIHRY-Q) and a principal of the L&M Group, a firm with coal-seam methane, lignite and petroleum properties in New Zealand.

Nautilus has secured a group of marine leases, including a package between New Ireland and East New Britain off the coast of Papua New Guinea. The company is negotiating with international law and administrative groups on further lease applications.

The junior has formed an alliance with Placer Dome (PDG-T) to jointly explore offshore of 16 western Pacific nations. Under the agreement, Placer must spend US$7 million to earn a 40% interest in any gold-rich deposits. Any high-grade copper and zinc deposits found would be owned entirely by Nautilus.

Nautilus plans to mine concentrations of mineralization from “dead” black smokers that emit volcanogenic massive sulphide-style mineralization via subterranean volcanic events. Shallow drilling off Papua New Guinea returned values of 13 grams gold, 5% copper and 20% zinc per tonne.

Nautilus Managing Director David Heydon told The Northern Miner that Placer Dome has completed a geophysical program and will spend US$4 million drilling the Papua New Guinea leases by April 2006.

Australian firm Worley Parsons Engineering has completed a prefeasibility study that envisages mining 2 million tonnes annually. Heydon said much of the technology and equipment used by the petroleum industry could be applied to seabed mineral mining. A group of technology and equipment firms, including Worley Parsons, provided technical input on the proposed operation. Worley Parsons estimated that the capital costs of a seabed massive sulphides mining operation would be about half those of a conventional land-based mine for the equivalent amount of copper production. Heydon said that cash costs would be around US39 per lb. copper, assuming no gold credits.

Heyson added that the mining equipment and riser pipe used in this type of operation could be re-deployed over many deposits in different countries, thereby further reducing development costs.