Berkeley Mineral Metallurgical, Mineral Plan On Time, Budget

LONDON (Dow Jones)--Berkeley Minerals Resources PLC (BMR.LN), a company primarily engaged in processing mining tailings, said Tuesday that the mineral and metallurgical due diligence program is proceeding to time and to budget. MAIN FACTS: -South African drilling company Dump and Dune were contracted to drill the washplant slimes section of the stockpiles and SGS has been retained to provide mineral grade and metallurgical assays. -Integrated Mapping Solutions have been appointed to provide a base model for volume analysis. -Phase One drilling required 17 drill holes which were completed on July. 19. Assay results from SGS are scheduled to be provided by the middle of August. -A 50 kg bulk sample for metallurgical analysis has also been taken and Mintek is now carrying out the metallurgical tests. -Previous independent assays estimated that the rest of the Kabwe stockpiles, known as the leach residue sections, comprised 6.7 million tons grading 4.5% zinc and 4.6% lead containing 434,000 tons of metal. -The drilling of 40 twin boreholes and assaying of cores in these sections required under JORC standards is currently being carried out. -The verification of BMR's existing dumps of slag material will follow and will require 30 single boreholes to provide assay samples. -Phase Two verification is to be completed by the end of September. -Shares closed Monday at 1.80 pence, valuing the company at GBP6.58 million. -By Razak Musah Baba, Dow Jones Newswires; 44-20-7842-9275; razak.baba@dowjones.com (END) Dow Jones Newswires July 27, 2010 02:44 ET (06:44 GMT)