South Harz Potash Ltd (ASX:SHP), a potash exploration and development company focused on Germany, has been granted a three-year extension to the Küllstedt exploration licence within its flagship South Harz Project.
This extension to January 2026 was granted by the Thuringian mining authority, Thüringer Landesamt für Umwelt, Bergbau und Naturschutz (TLUBN), within about one month of the application submission.
The Küllstedt exploration licence covers 242 square kilometres and contains a JORC-compliant inferred mineral resource of 1.538 billion tonnes grading 10.2% K2O.
“Substantial resource”
South Harz managing director Luis da Silva said: “We are pleased to announce the successful multi-year extension of the Küllstedt exploration licence term.
"The Küllstedt area contains a substantial potash resource that adjoins our high-grade Mühlhausen mining licence area.
"Our gratitude is extended to the TLUBN for their rapid evaluation and approval of our extension application.
"This extension grant demonstrates both the efficacy of the TLUBN permitting process and their constructive approach to implementing it.”
About Küllstedt
The Küllstedt exploration licence area was previously drilled by the former East German state potash mining company in the 1960s and 1980s.
Results from these campaigns facilitated the estimation of a JORC-compliant inferred resource estimate of 165 million tonnes.
The Küllstedt licence has been held by the company’s wholly-owned German subsidiary, Südharz Kali GmbH, since January 2015.
Within South Harz Potash Region
SHP’s flagship project is within the South Harz Potash Region of Germany, midway between Frankfurt and Berlin.
This project hosts a globally large-scale potash JORC (2012) resource estimate of 5 billion tonnes at 10.6% K2O of inferred resources and 258 million tonnes at 13.5% K2O of indicated resources across four wholly-owned project areas.
This comprises three perpetual potash mining licences - Ohmgebirge, Ebeleben and Mühlhausen-Nohra - and two potash exploration licences - Küllstedt and Gräfentonna - covering a total area of about 659 square kilometres.
With strong established infrastructure proximate to the key European market, the South Harz Project is well positioned to enable rapid economic development across multiple deposits.