Emmerson Resources Ltd (ASX:ERM) has summarised key achievements across its 50 exploration licences covering 3,771 square kilometres within the Northern Territory and New South Wales in the FY2019 annual report.
During the 12 months, the company formed a strategic alliance with Territory Resources Ltd to commission a central mill in Tennant Creek in order to support the processing from Emmerson’s small gold mines and other third-party feed in the NT.
This alliance extends to a $5 million earn-in by Territory over Emmerson’s Southern Project Area (SPA) at the Tennant Creek Mineral Field where Emmerson remains operator and manager.
It also extends to a mining joint venture over small mines from the SPA on a 75:25 profit share, except for the Edna Beryl mine and Chariot mines where the company receives a 12% and 6% gold production royalty respectively.
Northern Project Area
During the financial year, the company conducted 2,634 metres of drilling consisting of 1,781 metres of reverse circulation (RC) drilling and 583 metres of diamond drilling within the 100%-owned Northern Project Area (NPA) of Tennant Creek.
Best drilling results were obtained from the Mauretania prospect where drilling was designed to provide a complete geological and grade profile through both the shallow supergene and deeper primary gold zones.
High-grade results up to 54.1 g/t gold have increased the confidence in the potential for economic mineralisation in both the shallow oxide and deeper, primary gold zones.
Southern Project Area
Drilling in the Southern Project Area (SPA) is part of the $5 million earn-in funded by Territory aimed at testing for extensions to existing mineralisation which, if successful, can then be added to the mining schedule for development.
Results from The Susan prospect show potential for shallow, high-grade gold in the oxide zone exemplified by drill holes SS001 and SS003 which intersected 11 metres at 48 g/t gold from 26 metres and 8 metres at 15.7 g/t from 22 metres respectively.
These results provide potential for the Susan prospect to become part of the growing list of development projects in the mining schedule and it is likely that further pre-development drilling will be undertaken as part of earn-in expenditures by Territory.
The company is also fast-tracking exploration across five early-stage gold-copper projects in New South Wales, which lie along the highly prospective Macquarie Arc which has recorded more than 80 million ounces of gold and 13 million tonnes of copper.