Adavale seeks green light for uranium drilling at Lake Surprise

Adavale is seeking a key approval that will allow it to start exploration drilling testing shallow uranium targets at its Lake Surprise project in South Australia.

The submission of the Exploration Program of Environmental Protection and Rehabilitation to the Department of Energy and Mining in South Australia follows on the completion of final environmental works such as aerial imagery of the drill site and the radiation management plan for sampling.

Adavale Resources’ (ASX:ADD) 4,500m aircore drill program will target shallow mineralisation as its surface soil and gamma surveys suggest that highest uranium values are near surface.

Lake Surprise is prospective for uranium hosted within a silcrete capped paleochannel in proximity to the Flinders Ranges.

“Our team has been working diligently and in collaboration with the Dieri traditional owners and their consultants to secure the remaining exploration and government environmental approvals that will enable drilling to commence in October 2022,” executive director David Riekie said.

“The aircore drill program will take approximately 3 weeks and has been designed to focus on the shallow paleochannel zones prospective for uranium. Our target zones are at 30 meters depth, therefore the 80m x 180m grid spacing will result in a time and cost-efficient program.

“During the program the progressive gamma readings and portable XRF results will enable our geological team to interpret the preliminary results and commence planning for the next steps.”

Environmental works

Company geologist Patrick Harvey visited the proposed drill site in July 2022, to both locate and peg the proposed 150 drill hole sites and to also record the current condition of each site for subsequent rehabilitation.

This program was completed in conjunction with a drone survey to obtain imagery which will assist with compliance required for the “before” and “after” drilling condition of the site, and the drill site rehabilitation process as required by the DEM.

Associated incident reporting documentation and radiation management plans for exploration have also been submitted as part of the process required for the PEPR.

Exploration drilling

The planned drill program of between 50 and 150 holes on lines spaced 180m apart and with drill holes 80m along the drill lines is expected to provide the company with a cost effective method to rapidly gain information over the current exploration area and assess Lake Surprise’s uranium prospectivity.

Drilling is expected to generate a robust dataset that can be used to convert drill results into a JORC resource.

Adavale expects that additional but limited drilling might be required to confirm continuity of results between drill holes though past surface soil and gamma surveys suggest the current target area demonstrates the highest uranium values at surface and shallow mineralisation.

Separately, the company has been awarded EL6821 – formerly ELA2021/00151, which has similar geology and geophysical anomalies to Lake Surprise.

This licence will be systematically advanced in parallel with Lake Surprise.

This article was developed in collaboration with Adavale Resources, a Stockhead advertiser at the time of publishing.

This article does not constitute financial product advice. You should consider obtaining independent advice before making any financial decisions.