Mineral Resource estimate of gold potential
Pure Alumina requested an updated Mineral Resource estimate of gold potential at the Hargraves project, located near Hill End in central-western New South Wales. This Mineral Resource estimate builds on prior models and is reported in line with the JORC Code (2012).
Gold mineralisation is hosted within tightly folded saddle reef quartz veins and focused at the intersections with sub-vertical fault zones. This complex host geometry has previously proven challenging to approximate in software.
SRK used Leapfrog Geo software to model structural trends dynamically from source data, requiring minimal manual input, which can be costly in complex deposits like Hargraves. This process produced tangible results in challenging geology and helped ensure domains and modelled block grades conformed to the local fold geometry.
During geostatistical analysis, SRK discovered reasonable spatial continuity of gold grades within the estimation domain, challenging the characterisation of Hargraves as a classically high-nugget deposit, akin to Bendigo or Ballarat.
Mineral Resource estimation was conducted in Leapfrog Edge. The presence of extreme grade samples necessitated the use of grade thresholding to avoid bias in the modelled grade distribution. Model validation confirmed alignment of the modelled block and sample grade distributions.
