ASX-listed junior gold explorer Barton Gold is all set to hit the go-button on a first phase of drilling at its advanced Tunkillia gold project in South Australia after getting the nod from the state’s mining department for a key requisite environment protection and rehabilitation plan. The phase-one program will entail about 6,000 metres of reverse circulation drilling across about 40 holes as the Perth-based company looks to continue broadening its geological knowledge of the project’s fertile terrane in the Gawler Craton region.
The SA Mining Act stipulates that an exploration licence holder must have an approved Exploration Program for Environment Protection and Rehabilitation or “EPEPR” in place prior to the commencement of any exploration activities on site.
Barton is now permitted to undertake multiple drilling programs under the EPEPR.
Tunkillia’s cornerstone 223 deposit already hosts an existing indicated and inferred mineral resource of 26.1 million tonnes at an average grade of 1.15 grams per tonne for 965,000 ounces of contained gold.
Even though Barton boasts an armoury of brownfields assets including Tunkillia, it has opted not to pander to the presumptuousness of impatient punters looking for instant gratification and hoping it plunges headlong into a quick-fire pathway to production.
The company is instead aiming to make a fully informed decision on any development.
Barton has indicated it wants to build a more extensive geological picture of the regional-scale structures that its whopping 4,700 square kilometres of under-explored tenure in the Craton take in, via a more systematic exploration approach.
Over the past couple of years, the company has completed significant exploration work on its Gawler Craton pipeline of projects including a detailed review of historical exploration data, new high-resolution aeromagnetic and high-res ground penetrating surveys, geophysical reinterpretation, seismic analysis and drilling.
Barton’s hard yards have helped improve its geological understanding and prospectivity of the projects, which it says have the potential for material extensions and structural repeats of mineralisation across its enviable large ground-holdings position.
Barton Gold Managing Director Alexander Scanlon said: “We have prepared a robust program for our drilling activities, which will also see us systematically rehabilitating old drill holes left in a poor state by historical owners. Having secured this Exploration Program for Environment Protection and Rehabilitation, we are now fully permitted to commence phase one drilling at Tunkillia.”
The company and its peers including Taruga Minerals, Indiana Resources and Coda Minerals are leading the contemporary gold and copper exploration charge in the revered Gawler Craton.
They are the new pathfinders after Gawler Craton predecessors such as Helix Resources in the 1990s and Minotaur Exploration about 20 years ago propelled the market’s interest in the region.
Barton plans to carry out more than 20,000m of RC drilling at priority prospects over the next 12 months.
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By Matt Birney
