Mineral explorer Godolphin Resources has launched a 25-hole, 1,500m diamond drilling campaign at its Narraburra rare earths project near Temora in central-west New South Wales. The program kicked off following recent approval from the state’s mining regulator and aims to elevate the operation’s legacy resource to a JORC 2012 specification.
Godolphin was once seen as a predominantly gold and base metals explorer, however the company shifted gears and moved into the new energy space earlier this year after picking up Narraburra. The acquisition came after the company entered into a farm-in and joint venture agreement with private explorer EX9 – the transaction allowed the NSW-based Godolphin to earn an up to 75 per cent stake in the operation.
Notably, the project came gift-wrapped with a JORC 2004 inferred resource of 73.2 million tonnes at the site, courtesy of a previous owner - Capital Mining. The figure includes 327 grams per tonne rare earth oxides, 146 g/t yttrium oxide, 126 g/t niobium pentoxide, 54 g/t gallium oxide, 118 g/t lithium oxide and 1250 g/t zirconium dioxide.
Management says the in-progress diamond program will allow it to test Narraburra’s rare earths potential at depth, allow sample collection for a swathe of metallurgical test work and ultimately push it closer to the delivery of a revised resource estimate.
Current data points to Narraburra’s rare earth mineralisation being open at depth and the company believes more work with the drill bit could allow it to determine if the commodity runs laterally.
The latest plan of attack follows a maiden 4-hole, 285m-plus diamond campaign at the project. The August campaign was used to drill test the site’s bedrock for mineralisation.
Godolphin Resources’ Managing Director, Jeneta Owens said:“The campaign has been designed to test the resource at depth and for rare earth element and rare metal mineralisation within and around the previously defined mineralisation. The Company will also target specific areas of interest from the August 2022 campaign, which are currently being assayed and will be reported shortly.”
Godolphin believes Narraburra could house one of Australia’s largest rare earth resources and says the tenure is also prospective for lithium and rare metals.
The ground’s rare earths prospectivity is tied to is significant occurrences of zirconium, yttrium and niobium. The materials are respectively used to manufacture glass, metal alloys and superconductive magnets for electric vehicles.
Narraburra takes in two tenements for a total land position of almost 350 square kilometres in the highly prospective Lachlan Fold Belt. Previous metallurgical test work on bulk samples derived from the site indicates zirconium and niobium could be economically recovered and Godolphin appears fully intent on testing that theory.
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