Active ASX-listed junior Bulletin Resources Ltd has two early-stage exploration irons in the fire in its home state of Western Australia.
The first is its wholly-owned Lake Rebecca gold project located 150 kilometres north east of Kalgoorlie-Boulder, which is part of a 1100 square kilometre land holding in the southern Laverton Tectonic Zone that is near three yellow metal plays ‒ Northern Star Resources Ltd’s 4 million ounce Carosue Dam mine as well as Ramelius Resources Ltd’s 1.4Moz Rebecca and 1.8Moz Roe deposits.
During the March quarter, the company consolidated its position in the region via the acquisition of 509km² of tenure adjacent to Lake Rebecca, where shallow drilling has already returned a number of positive gold assays at Goat Dam (like 4 metres at 3.6 grams/tonne from 131m, 3m at 4.25g/t from 89m and 1m at 5.92g/t from 155m), Grahams Find (2m at 14.14g/t from 33m and 8m at 1.85g/t from 28m), Mulgabbie (7m at 3.51g/t from 45m and 2m at 4.9g/t from 51m) and Old Homestead (2m at 8.19g/t from 60m and 4m at 1.41g/t from 67m).
The newly-acquired tenements are immediately south east and along strike of OzAurum Resources Ltd’s recent high grade drill results, including 20m at 3.57g/t and 9m at 5.79g/t, at Mulgabbie North.
They are also along strike of Kalgoorlie Gold Mining Ltd’s 76.4Koz Kirgella Gift deposit and the nearby Lighthorse prospect, where recent field work returned an intercept of 17m at 4.81g/t.
In its March quarterly, Bulletin said this new land package had three established north-north west oriented gold mineralised trends.
The western trend is associated with extensive drill defined gold-arsenic anomalies that straddle branches of the KKSZ system and includes the Graham’s Find, Graham’s Find South, Graham’s Find East, Mulgabbie South and Old Homestead targets.
These prospects are south east and along strike of Carosue Dam, which has been in production since 2001, and Mulgabbie North.
Meanwhile, the central trend is associated with drill defined gold anomalism that straddles the Laverton/Pinjin and Celia fault systems and includes Goats Dam, Bosses Dam and Yindi SE.
As for the eastern trend, it extends into the Rebecca gold system and comprises the structural corridor hosting mineralisation such as Kirgella Gift deposit and the nearby Lighthorse.
During the recent RIU Sydney Resources Round-up, Bulletin chief executive Mark Csar suggested Lake Rebecca was showing plenty of promise with its multiple gold trends, similar intercepts to those immediately along strike to the south on top of wide yellow metal anomalism (over 10m with localised higher grade zones).
These signs, Csar said, were highly encouraging for ongoing exploration.
Bulletin’s second major early stage project is its wholly-owned 130km² Ravensthorpe lithium play, which sits only 12km south west and along strike of the publicly-listed Rio Tinto’s Mt Cattlin lithium mine.
It hosts outcropping, high grade spodumene bearing-pegmatites, and initial drilling of these pegmatites is proposed to determine their potential economic importance.
Csar said surface mineralisation suggested strong potential for this critical mineral at depth. It had also revealed coarse high grade spodumene, an “excellent” concentrate grade of over 6 per cent lithium oxide, recoveries of over 75 per cent, a low deleterious content of 0.5 per cent iron oxide plus over 100 pegmatites.
While the WA Government last year knocked back Bulletin’s native vegetation clearing permit application ‒ a prerequisite to clear access for tracks and drill pads to allow drilling at Ravensthorpe to progress – it is the junior’s view there are no reasonable grounds for the refusal.
The explorer has subsequently lodged an appeal against the decision to the WA Office of the Appeals Convenor on the basis that the state government erred in its decision and did not appropriately assess or consider its expert and independent environmental reports, which had found that any environmental impact resulting from the proposed drilling program would not be significant.
Furthermore, Bulletin believed the refusal did not take into account detailed and comprehensive avoidance, mitigation and offset measures it had suggested.
Additionally, expert and independent environmental assessments also demonstrated the proposed drilling program would not result in any significant impact on the environment.
Bulletin’s expert evidence was further supported by an earlier decision of WA’s Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) not to assess the proposed field work.
“The EPA decides not to assess a proposal when it determines that the likely effect on the environment is not so significant as to warrant any further work or investigation,” the company pointed out in its March quarterly.
