The Hazen Pozzolan Project is located in Churchill County in Northern Nevada 20 miles by road from the town of Fernley and 24 miles by road from the County town of Fallon.
The Company’s mining claims were staked in June 2021 to cover a deposit of glassy pumice targeted as a natural pozzolan. Pumice is currently mined elsewhere in the US as natural pozzolan and at Hazen was mined as a lightweight aggregate from a shallow open pit some decades ago.
The markets for natural pozzolan, as a replacement for cement and fly ash in concrete, are regional and reflect the distribution of the main areas of high population density where concrete demand is highest.
The Hazen pozzolan deposit is just 9km from a rail siding on the arterial east-west Union Pacific line and is therefore well positioned for rail transport to the regional markets of northern California, points east, as well as the local markets around Reno and northern Nevada.
Its location is therefore complementary to the Company’s CS Pozzolan-Perlite Project which is targeting different cement and concrete markets in southern California and the expanding adjacent cities of Las Vegas and Henderson in southern Nevada.
Whilst the Hazen Project is less advanced than the CS Project, the Company’s laboratory testwork to date has shown that the material present in the pit is of similar high quality to the CS Project pozzolan. It exceeds the specifications of ASTM standard C6181 and mitigates the deleterious alkali silica reaction that occurs when concrete is made using reactive aggregates.
The Hazen pumice has the additional property that it is lightweight and so it will also be evaluated for its potential as a lightweight aggregate for use in lightweight concrete blocks and facing stones.
Bulk Sampling
Sunrise Resources has started a collaborative arrangement with an existing processor of natural pozzolan for mining and test grinding of a bulk sample of the Company’s Hazen natural pozzolan deposit in northern Nevada.
This follows successful laboratory testing of the Hazen pozzolan by both parties and the test programme will provide further information on the mining characteristics and grinding behaviour of the Hazen natural pozzolan on a commercial scale.
Approximately 250 tons of natural pozzolan has been extracted and will be processed at no cost to Sunrise.
Further work is required to determine the extent of the Hazen deposit although indications are that the pumice may extend several hundred meters beyond the limits of the existing open pit.
1 ASTM C618 is the international standard specification for coal fly ash and raw or calcined natural pozzolan for use in concrete where cementitious or pozzolanic action, or both, is desired, or where other properties normally attributed to fly ash or pozzolans may be desired, or where both objectives are to be achieved.
