【Ferro-alloys.com】: Searching for copper, Empire Metals instead found two billion tonnes of titanium ore. Its Pitfield project is now creating a new supply chain for the critical metal.

When Empire Metals set out to explore old copper workings in Western Australia’s wheatbelt region in 2023, managing director Shaun Bunn wasn’t expecting to stumble onto a world-changing deposit. But that’s exactly what happened 160km south of Geraldton, where drilling revealed a geological anomaly of extraordinary proportions: what is likely the world’s largest known deposit of titanium.

The company announced a maiden mineral resource estimate for the Pitfield project in October. With some 2.2 billion tonnes at 5.1 per cent titanium dioxide, spread across a 40km strike at depths of up to 5km, it’s a discovery Bunn describes as “a giant hidden in plain sight”.

The explorer, listed on the London Stock Exchange’s Alternative Investment Market and cross-traded on the US OTCQX, has moved at remarkable speed. In the two and a half years since that discovery, it has been able to produce high-purity titanium dioxide, and Bunn is confident the momentum will be maintained.

“We’ve assembled a world-class technical team and we’re not slowing down,” he said. “Having five or six internationally recognised metallurgical laboratories right here in Perth, plus established infrastructure on our doorstep, means we can move faster than most projects of this scale.”

The Pitfield project now stands as one of the world’s largest titanium resources, but making the discovery even more compelling is its favourable location. The massive site shares proximity to established infrastructure, including rail, gas, power and port facilities, that could position the project as a critical supplier in an increasingly strategic global titanium market.

Unexpected find

Empire’s journey to this discovery began with a different target entirely. The company was investigating historical copper workings in the wheatbelt when drilling intercepted the unexpected titanium mineralisation of exceptional quality and scale.

What emerged wasn’t a conventional mineral sands deposit, nor a typical hard rock ilmenite body. This was something geologically unique: a sedimentary basin filled with titanite, altered by ancient hydrothermal fluids.

“We drilled down 400m and every metre was in ore,” Bunn said. “It ended in ore, but the geophysics trace this thing down 5km into the basin.”

The dimensions are eye-opening: 40km long, 10km wide and potentially much deeper than any drilling has yet been able to confirm.

Bunn said the massive system has been sitting beneath wheat paddocks, waiting for someone to start drilling. Empire drilled approximately 20 per cent of the prospective area to define the maiden resource, suggesting significant expansion potential remains.

What separates Pitfield from traditional titanium operations becomes apparent at surface level. Natural weathering has transformed the top 40–60m of mineralisation into anatase, a pure titanium dioxide mineral comparable to high-value rutile. This weathered zone requires no overburden stripping, which means mining can begin directly in ore.

The contrast with conventional operations is stark. Typical mineral sands deposits grade between 1–2 per cent titanium dioxide; Pitfield averages 5.1 per cent, reaching close to 10 per cent in places. Hard rock ilmenite operations require energy-intensive smelting; Pitfield’s softer, friable surface material involves free-digging only in the upper levels.

“We don’t have to move as many tonnes, there’s no waste to remove, so our mining costs and carbon footprint are way down compared to beach sands,” Bunn said.

Perhaps most significantly, Pitfield’s ore contains none of the problematic elements that often plague other titanium deposits. There’s no thorium, no uranium, no chromium and no vanadium, contaminants that are notoriously difficult to remove during processing and can compromise final product quality.

In early June, Empire announced it had produced titanium dioxide at 99.25 per cent purity from the Pitfield site, a pigment-grade product achieved without the usual battles against deleterious elements.

Empire’s metallurgical test work has also revealed a processing pathway that avoids many of the energy-intensive steps required by conventional titanium producers. Initial results show the ore responds well to scrubbing and screening to remove finer material, followed by gravity separation and flotation to concentrate the titanium minerals.

The real advantage emerges in the digestion phase. Unlike hard rock ilmenite that requires smelting, or mineral sands that need large rotary kilns to produce synthetic rutile, Pitfield’s anatase appears to break down through simpler chemical processes.

The company has demonstrated it can progress from concentrate to high-purity titanium dioxide without the significant energy inputs that define traditional operations.

“The minerals themselves break up pretty easily in the digestion process,” Bunn said. “We don’t need to smelt it like a hard rock producer, and we don’t need a big kiln to make synthetic rutile. Our process test work is indicating we’ve got a much simpler process to get to pigment.”

But pigment production, while commercially significant, isn’t Empire’s only goal. The company has hired a marketing manager and is planning to move to continuous pilot-scale testing in early 2026. The objective will be to produce sufficient quantities of titanium products, from pigment to intermediate compounds, that can be sent to potential customers for evaluation.

Those customers represent the high end of the titanium market: major chemical groups for pigment applications, and aerospace manufacturers for titanium metal. The key compound Empire is targeting is titanium tetrachloride, the feedstock required to produce titanium metal itself.

“The Holy Grail is actually getting to metal,” Bunn said. “That’s what we’re chasing, because that’s where the critical minerals story becomes real.”

The titanium metal market is valued at approximately $US24 billion annually and growing at around four per cent per year. However, it faces a supply concentration problem with Chinese producers currently dominating.

Empire has been engaging with Australia’s critical minerals policymakers for the last two years, and the company sees potential access to the $4.5 billion critical minerals facility managed by Australian Export Finance.

“Western aircraft manufacturers and defence departments want long-term supply security as they’re reluctant to lock into supply chains with only one country,” Bunn said. “We’re offering a Tier 1 location with the scale and infrastructure to become a genuine alternative source.”

With several hundred years of potential mining life already indicated in just 20 per cent of the prospective area, Empire’s focus now shifts to proving the commercial pathway from ore to metal. If successful, Pitfield could reshape global titanium supply chains from its unlikely location in WA farming territory. 

• [Editor:Alakay]