Golden State’s on the hunt for lithium with “aggressive” drilling at Yule

Lithium is at the forefront of Golden State’s exploration efforts with the launch of an aggressive drilling campaign across its Yule project in the Pilbara’s Mallina Basin.

First up on the strike list is the Nomad lithium prospect where the company will carry out up to 2,000m of reverse circulation drilling with holes of up to 200m depth to follow-up on encouraging lithium and caesium intercepts returned in its first pass drilling. This work builds on recent detailed gravity and magnetic surveys.

Detailed ground gravity surveys identified several patterns which could be interpreted as concealed pegmatites, corroborated by magnetic data showing breaks in the north-south magnetic trends consistent with the intrusion of interpreted non-magnetic pegmatites.

Golden State Mining (ASX:GSM) also plans to carry out reconnaissance RC and aircore drilling of the Balla Yule nickel and lithium target in the north of the Yule project area and up to 14,000m of further aircore drilling targeting multiple targets – including Nomad – from late August.

A sensible focus

The company’s interest in the Pilbara is unsurprising given it sees considerable hard rock lithium exploration and development from the likes of Pilbara Minerals (ASX:PLS), Mineral Resources (ASX:MIN) and Azure Minerals (ASX:AZS).

“We are pleased to announce the start of our RC drilling campaign focused on the Yule project’s Nomad prospect,” managing director Michael Moore said.

“Aeromagnetic surveys and a detailed ground gravity survey at Nomad have provided us with exciting lithium targets and we look forward to updating our shareholders in the coming months as assays are returned from the lab.

“The Pilbara region’s Mallina Basin continues to grow from strength to strength for its world class lithium prospectivity and Golden State Mining is glad to have its skin in the game in one of Western Australia’s most exciting jurisdictions with exposure to the world’s critical, battery minerals industry.”

RC rig at the Nomad prospect. Pic: Supplied (GSM).

Drill plans

Besides the 2,000m program targeting concealed, approximately east-northeast trending, low density pattern targets at Nomad – which are located in close proximity to highly anomalous caesium values returned in its first pass RC drilling – Golden State also has a full program of drilling planned for the rest of the 766km² project.

At Balla-Yule, which is an interpreted dislocated layered mafic-ultramafic intrusive hosting nickel-cobalt-copper sulphide style mineralisation, the company will drill up to three reconnaissance RC holes to test for nickel and lithium once drilling at Nomad is completed.

The combination of a single anomalous nickel and lithium hole from historical RC drilling completed in the early 2000s, alongside inconclusive electromagnetic survey work, demonstrates the need for effective drill testing of Balla Yule to determine its nickel and copper prospectivity as well as lithium pegmatite intrusive potential.

Aircore drilling will also be carried out over a range of new and follow up targets over the project area once RC drilling is completed.

Some potential targets include M1, which has anomalous caesium values and a favourable structural position in the core of an interpreted major antiform of up to 3.5km, M2 – a target based on overlapping lithium-caesium-arsenic anomalism on the western side of the major antiform, and M3 which is based on anomalous lithium-rubidium-caesium intercepts within associated mafic schists.

This article was developed in collaboration with Golden State Mining, 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.