Categories: Energy
Topics: General Energy

Azincourt Energy (TSX-V: AAZ)(OTCQB: AZURF) CEO Alex Klenman on Vectoring Towards a New Uranium Discovery

 

Gerardo Del Real: This is Gerardo Del Real with Resource Stock Digest. Joining me today is the CEO of Azincourt Energy, Mr. Alex Klenman. Alex, how are you today? It's great to have you on. It's been a bit.

Alex Klenman: Yeah. No, thank you for having me. I always love your intros. I feel like the curtain's going to open and I'm heading out to sit next to Johnny Carson or something. I think it's great.

Gerardo Del Real: Kind words. I appreciate it. Look, let's hope the curtain is opening on vectoring in towards a significant discovery. We talked discovery the last few times, and we talked about how prospective the drilling had been and how you're vectoring towards what you think is going to be pretty fruitful drilling here. And you just received your drill permit at the East Preston Uranium Project, of course, in the Athabasca Basin. So I wanted to have you on and talk about that and see what comes next. I think it's going to be a bombshell of a 2023 for all of us.

Alex Klenman: I hope so. And I've been bullish on uranium for years. It's been a long haul. Most people that are in this space as an investor or working in it, we've watched this carefully. And we've come out of a long bear. And we had a couple of really nice ... I don't want to call them false starts, but in indicative of what this market could be like for uranium. And I think what happened here is in 2022, with the broad market issues, finally uranium equities took a hit. But fundamentally speaking, the reasons why the next few years look really good in this space, those remain on the table. So we're ready to go. We just got our permit, as you mentioned. The consultation process was a little lengthier this year, but still good. We have a great relationship with the First Nations in our area, CRDN. We work closely with them. And we're happy to get on the ground. We're going to do our road prep here in December and get the camp and the road built, and we'll be ready to go first, second week of January.

Gerardo Del Real: Excellent. The last time that you really were working to delineate these zones, you encountered some 200 meters of hematite alteration, right? It was almost 200 meters wide. Can you explain why that was important? Often time, everybody is just excited about, and rightfully so, right, finding an economic discovery. But the work that goes into being able to do that in a meaningful way, I think is overlooked often, especially in a tough market.

Alex Klenman: No, you are absolutely correct, it is. The relevance and the importance and the significance of finding these hematite zones, these alteration zones, cannot be understated or overstated; I'm not sure which way to go on that. But the reality is alteration zones typically form halos around deposits, and this is how you chase significant mineralization. You go through these zones. So we drilled 5,000 meters last year. We ended up with 1,700 meters of alteration zones, some of them, as you mentioned, up to 200 meters thick, which is quite substantial. But the hematite is usually further away from the bullseye, which is that uranium mineralization. And then as you get closer, you typically run into clays.

And so we're starting to run into the clays now. And I guess the big takeaway from last year was we confirmed that uranium-bearing fluids are present, have been present in these alteration zones. So again, just another box you tick off on the road to discovery. It takes time. You can run into something by accident, but it usually takes a little time. These footprints of these uranium deposits, they're not massive. They're pretty small, compared to what you're doing. I mean, we've got 100 meters between holes, and you could have a 40-, 50-meter footprint for a large deposit that you've skipped, you've gone right over or you've missed.

So we're going to tighten up the grid a little bit here in some of the better zones that we identified last year. And we're hopeful that we're going to continue to push this work. Would I like to see a massive hit? Absolutely. Will we be happy, again, pushing this forward, getting closer, showing more evidence that we're in the right area? Absolutely. So patience, I think is the name of the game. I mean, look at our friends at Fission 3.0 and what they've just done. They hit a hole. They've been drilling that project for years. So I mean, sometimes it takes time. But I think patience, which is the missing link in the markets now, and particularly in a bad year, where people are forced economically to maybe sell stock they don't want to sell ... I think we're coming out of it. And I think the patience here for East Preston will be rewarded.

Gerardo Del Real: I couldn't agree more. Azincourt controls a majority 72.8% interest in the East Preston project. Of course, your joint venture partner is Skyharbour Resources on the rest of it. I happen to know Jordan pretty well, and he speaks highly of the project. If they didn't have what looks like two flagships of their own keeping them very, very busy, I suspect this would be at the top of the list. Anything to add to the macro take on the uranium space, Alex, before I let you go?

Alex Klenman: Yeah. No, it's funny, we go back ... I was out of town in Q3 of '21, and all of a sudden, the uranium stocks, everything came to life. And I would urge people to go back and look at random charts for uranium equities and NETFs and things back at that point, and look what happens when sentiment comes roaring in. And everyone just gets a 30%, 40% bump just on that. So it'll come back. Fundamentals say so. We have the macro picture, which is giving us ... We're swimming upstream against some pretty powerful forces, but things will settle, and I think we'll get that pop again. It can happen overnight, and it will. So sit tight, let everybody do what they're doing, follow the good exploration stories. And let's hope 2023 gives us something really exciting.

Gerardo Del Real: Well said. Have a great holiday. See you on the other side of this year, Alex. Thank you so much.

Alex Klenman: Appreciate it, Gerardo, as always. And Merry Christmas, happy holidays to you and yours.

Gerardo Del Real: Cheers.

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