Zenith Minerals is reporting its highest-grade zinc hit to date at Develin Creek, where resource update drilling has delivered results of up to 18.1 per cent of the metal.

A three-rig drilling campaign has been underway at the Central Queensland site to test copper-zinc targets at Wilsons North, Snook and four targets surrounding the existing Sulphide City JORC massive copper-zinc sulphide deposits.

New results from Sulphide City include an intersection of 9m grading at 1.8 per cent copper, 18.1 per cent zinc, 0.6 g/t gold and 28.4 g/t silver. That occurred within a wider zone of 19m grading at 1.2 per cent copper, 11.9 per cent zinc, 0.4 g/t gold and 20.4 g/t silver.

“The very high-grade zinc results from hole ZSCCD020 are a pleasant surprise,” Zenith managing director Michael Clifford said.

“Future drilling will assess if the 9m at 1.8 per cent copper and 18.1 per cent zinc intercept is an isolated patch or potentially a significant high-grade mineralised vertical fault zone.

“This new strongly zinc mineralised intersection along with the southern strike extensions indicated by ZSCCD018, demonstrates the remaining upside to the Sulphide City resource area.”

It comes as Zenith looks to demerge its non-battery minerals projects, including base metals and gold assets, into a new company to be listed on ASX.

It is focused instead on minerals containing lithium and related metals required for rechargeable lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles and renewable energy storage, backed by a new alliance with the EV Metals Group.

Its Queensland assets include the Red Mountain gold project and Develin Creek, which has an inferred mineral resource of 2.57Mt grading at 1.76 per cent copper, 2.01 per cent zinc, 0.24g/t gold and 9.6g/t silver.