The project is 200km south of Darwin in the Northern Territory’s world-class Pine Creek mineral field, one of the world’s largest and richest uranium provinces that contains the Alligator River, Rum Jungle and South Alligator Valley deposits.
Despite this potential, the region remains lightly explored – particularly in the southern Daly Basin area, where the geology supports multiple ideal settings for sandstone-hosted uranium deposits.
Greenvale Energy (ASX:GRV) notes that the Douglas River project contains multiple uranium/thorium ratio anomalies concentrated within two interpreted palaeochannels on the western and eastern margins of the tenements.
Of these, two compelling high-order radiometric anomalies have been identified in the eastern palaeochannel that are walk-up drill targets prospective for sandstone-hosted uranium mineralisation analogous to Boss Energy’s (ASX:BOE) Honeymoon, Core Lithium’s (ASX:CXO) Napperby, and the Pamela/Angela deposits.
These targets are at depths of less than 50m, meaning that they could potentially be drilled using low-cost auger, sonic or air-core methods.
“This is a compelling addition to Greenvale’s portfolio, giving our shareholders exposure to a commodity which has exceptional market fundamentals because of the growing use of nuclear energy as an essential source of baseload energy for the global energy transition,” chief executive officer Mark Turner said.
“The Douglas Project is an extensive and highly prospective ground package located in the heart of one of the world’s great uranium provinces, which hosts several world-class deposits and yet has remained virtually unexplored for over a decade.
“Importantly, the farm-in agreement is attractively structured with a low upfront entry cost and, because the targets are shallow, the project can be explored with low-cost drilling techniques.
“We are very much looking forward to getting on the ground and commencing exploration activities at this exciting new project.”
The Douglas project area on the southwestern side of the Pine Creek mineral field has been historically explored for a number of minerals including uranium, gold, tin, base metals and diamonds with extensive anomalism defined from surface sampling.
It was most recently explored by United Uranium in 2012, which carried out an airborne electromagnetic survey over the entire project area and closed-spaced airborne radiometric survey over a well-defined geochemical anomaly in the eastern palaeochannel.
This work was what defined the two palaeochannels on the eastern and western margins of the project area as well as the multiple uranium/thorium ratio anomalies, which are concentrated within the two palaeochannels.
While it subsequently defined a significant drill target over the south-eastern anomaly with a close-spaced airborne radiometric survey, United abruptly ceased work following the Fukushima disaster.
The northeastern uranium anomaly is defined by 400m line spacing radiometrics and requires close-spaced (100m) airborne radiometrics for better definition prior to drilling.
GRV plans to fly close-spaced magnetics/radiometrics over the entire project area as a precursor to ground exploration.
It can earn the interest in Douglas River by completing a definitive feasibility study.
