Ardea Resources Limited (ASX:ARL) has commenced a research project with Australia’s national science agency the CSIRO’s Regolith Geosciences team studying the behaviour of gold within and adjacent to the critical mineral deposits of the Goongarrie Nickel Cobalt Project (GNCP) in Western Australia.
Ardea’s Managing Director, Andrew Penkethman, said the area is of scientific interest as most nickel-cobalt laterite deposits are not associated with gold mineralisation. However, the GNCP has developed on ultramafic rocks within the Bardoc Tectonic Zone (BTZ), a major crustal-scale, gold-mineralising series of structures in one of the world’s greatest gold mining provinces, the Eastern Goldfields of WA.
As such, we see extensive gold anomalism associated with the critical mineral (nickel-cobalt) deposits of the GNCP, including defined resources within the host ultramafic sequence at Big Four Gold,” Mr Penkethman said.
The main aim of the Ardea-CSIRO project is to gain a better understanding of gold and critical mineral behaviour in the Goongarrie laterite to assist exploration and future development. This will include:
- Definition of the relationship between gold, nickel and cobalt, within the profile, and will determine whether gold and pathfinder anomalism represent dispersion from primary mineralisation below or are associated with remnant structures such as veins or shear zones; and
- Where dispersion haloes are evident, an initial assessment of the distance and direction of anomaly migration away from the primary source will be defined.
The study will run for approximately seven months and will utilise proprietary, cutting-edge CSIRO techniques to image and define gold and critical mineral relationships within the deposits of the GNCP. It is co-funded by Ardea and the Australian Government’s Entrepreneurs’ Programme.
Mr Penkethman said Ardea expects that the study will greatly assist exploration, discovery and future exploitation of further critical mineral and gold mineralisation in addition to the substantial nickel-cobalt deposits already defined. This will greatly assist future GNCP and broader Kalgoorlie Nickel Project (KNP) development.
“Ardea is proud to work with CSIRO to advance scientific knowledge of the unique GNCP critical mineral deposits and their associated gold mineralisation,” MrPenkethman said.
“Through focused and collaborative research, Ardea will gain a competitive advantage that will be used to further understand critical minerals and gold mineralisation beneath the lateritic deposits of the GNCP and elsewhere in the KNP.
“This is an example of Ardea’s innovative approach to maximise the value of the GNCP for all stakeholders and strategic investors.”
