Barkly samples hit lab in resource expansion push

Barkly Rare Earths has sent the first batch of samples from its 10,000-metre resource expansion drill campaign to the laboratory, a key step in its push to grow its already significant rare earths inventory at its flagship Barkly project in the Northern Territory.

The campaign is designed to test for shallow mineralisation around the company’s existing 40-million-tonne inferred mineral resource, which grades an impressive 2100 parts per million (ppm) total rare earth oxides (TREO).

Previous drilling between these two areas intersected rare earths hinting at the potential for significant lateral expansion across the intervening 20-kilometre corridor.

Barkly has defined an exploration target that gives a sense of the scale it is chasing. It ranges from 200 million to 1 billion tonnes at a grade of between 1600 and 1900 ppm TREO. If the company can get anywhere near even the lower end of that range, it could potentially be sitting on a globally significant deposit.

‘This is where the campaign moves from metres drilled to assay results.’

Barkly Rare Earths managing director Craig Wright

The company has adopted a two-pronged strategy for the campaign. The early stage will involve drilling a series of deeper, 60-metre holes to provide a stronger geological framework for the current deposit. The rig will then move on to the main event, a pattern of up to 400 shallow holes averaging just 25 metres deep targeting an area dubbed the Immediate Zone.

This Immediate Zone sits within an underexplored 20-kilometre corridor connecting the two resource areas with the first samples from the program having already arrived at the ALS lab in Brisbane for analysis.

Barkly Rare Earths managing director Craig Wright said: “The objective is clear, test the shallow mineralisation around our existing 40 Mt Inferred Resource and generate the data intended to support a resource update later this year.”

Barkly says what makes the project compelling is not just the potential scale but the high proportion of valuable magnet rare earth oxides which account for 34 per cent of the total resource. These are the elements critical for manufacturing high-strength magnets used in everything from electric vehicles to wind turbines.

Critically, initial test work has yielded low levels of uranium and thorium – both unwanted elements which can often complicate processing.

In another notable milestone leaching tests achieved a 74 per cent extraction rate for magnet rare earths with early-stage beneficiation work producing a mineral concentrate grading a hefty 29,000 ppm TREO.

Additionally, Barkly is armed with two recent grants of $115,000 each awarded under the Northern Territory’s highly regarded Geophysics and Drilling Collaborations program.

And while the company’s main game is its rare earths project, it also holds the Buntine project in the Northern Territory where it is chasing green fields base metals. Notably, it says the project’s geology at Buntine is the same as the rocks that host the world-class McArthur River lead-zinc deposit with polymetallic mineralisation already having been identified along a nine-kilometre strike length. Initial rock chipping has returned grades of up to one per cent lead, 1760 ppm cobalt and 7100 ppm nickel.

In what looks to be a savvy business play, Barkly has farmed out the uranium rights at its Murphy West project, also in the NT, to fellow ASX-listed explorer DevEx Resources. The deal allows DevEx to earn up to a 75 per cent interest by spending $3.5 million over five years, giving Barkly an exploration “free kick” on its ground.

With the initial drill samples from its rare earths expansion campaign at the lab, the market will be watching for the first of the assay results to begin flowing shortly.

Barkly has flagged its intentions to deliver a mineral resource updated during the final quarter of the year, and given the company is starting with 40 million tonnes in the bag, the company clearly has a huge exploration target in sight. And with plenty of prospective ground to test, things could soon get very interesting for Barkly as it looks to potentially define a project of global significance.

Is your ASX-listed company doing something interesting? Contact: mattbirney@bullsnbears.com.au