Estrella recruits second rig in Goldfields nickel hunt

Estrella Resources has rallied a second rig to accelerate exploration at its 100 per cent owned Carr Boyd nickel and copper sulphide project, 80km northeast of Kalgoorlie in WA.

The company is wheeling the brand new UDR1200 diamond drill rig to the T5 prospect where it will target expansions to the mineralisation along strike and at depth. The holes will initially test an array of downhole electromagnetic plates generated from earlier drilling.

Notably, the high priority conductive targets extend away from the known T5 nickel and copper sulphide mineralisation, boding well for the scale of the prospect.

Estrella Resources Managing Director, Chris Daws said:

“DHTEM has been extremely useful in targeting extensions to the high-grade massive nickel and copper sulphides discovered at T5 and there are currently multiple EM plates leading away from high-grade mineralisation that need to be tested over the coming weeks to determine their significance. With the brand new UDR1200 diamond rig now operating on site, we should see improvement in drilling rates.”

To date, the mineralisation at T5 has been registered over a 600m vertical extent with a strike of about 400m. The aim of the ongoing drilling will be to extend the mineralised envelope to the south and at depth.

The most recent holes completed at T5 located multiple zones of nickel and copper sulphides including high-grade massive sulphides over 4 per cent. Importantly, the hole yielding the highest grades remains open at depth and has generated downhole electromagnetic plates for further testing.

Along with its auxiliary equipment, the new drill rig can reach depths greater than 3000m and will be a welcome replacement for the less capable RC rig.

The origin of Estrella’s brownfield project lies in the discovery of the Carr Boyd Rocks deposit in 1968 by Great Boulder Mines. Since then, the deposit has been subject to multiple rounds of production and exploration – extensional and regional – until Estrella tabled a significant discovery of magmatic nickel and copper sulphides about 1.2km north of the historical mine.

A new report by the World Bank Group suggests that as the globe shifts toward net-zero emissions, the demand for critical metals ­– including nickel – is likely to spur to unprecedented levels with prices for the hot commodities potentially remaining elevated for a prolonged period.

In particular, the report brands nickel as a “winner” commodity due to its role in the ongoing electrification of transport and growing demand for batteries.

A little known fact is that whilst every lithium battery contains 8kgs of lithium, it contains 35kgs of nickel – making that commodity at least as important as the revered lithium.

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