Norwest is gearing up for an extensive exploration season across its projects in Western Australia during the second half of 2022.

Exploration is set to begin in August with a reverse circulation program targeting exceptionally high-grade copper associated with four key targets at its Bali project about 250km west of Newman.

Norwest Minerals (ASX:NWM) will then turn its attention to the Arunta West project near the state border with the Northern Territory, where it is currently conducting a campaign of mapping, rock chip and infill sampling.

RC drilling targeting rare earth elements (REE), iron oxide copper-gold (IOCG), lithium and gold anomalies is poised to begin in October.

Other activities include applying for a mining lease and reviewing processing options for the Bulgera gold project, a full geochemical database review and target generation at Marymia East that will be followed by drilling in late 2022, and a review of the Marriott nickel project for sale or joint venture operations.

Historical copper mining leaves plenty of potential

Bali covers 41km2 with four prospects identified along the 8km northwest trending Bali shear zone and has seen small-scale copper mining in the 1950s and 1960s.

Despite this, only the Bali Lo and Bali High areas have been drill tested, primarily with shallow holes dating back 33 years that returned intersections of up to 6m grading 7.2% copper.

More recent exploration carried out by Norwest in 2018 included the collection of rock chips from the Bali Hi, Bali Lo and Bali East prospects that returned an average grade of 6.3% copper.

The company plans to carry out a 30 hole RC program totalling 4,000m in August to test the four key targets for their potential to host copper and other base metals.

Critical minerals exploration

Over at the 840km2 Arunta West project where analysis of a new 10,000 point multi-element soils database had identified strong REE, lithium and IOCG targets, Norwest recently completed mapping and rock chip sampling across drill-ready target zones.

It has since started infill soil sampling and is preparing to carry out RC drilling in October.

The company has identified a 3km zone of coincident/elevated REE with a geological setting equivalent to the Dazzler and Iceman REE deposits at Northern Mineral’s Browns Range project.

It also mapped out a 3km by 1.5km copper anomaly that is on strike from IGO’s Arcee gold prospect and is prospective for IOCG mineralisation as well as a strong gold anomaly identified from close spaced soil samples.

There’s even more to come

Bulgera already hosts a resource of 5.1Mt at 1.2 grams per tonne gold for a contained resource of 200,000oz of gold.

Norwest is now targeting the many known near-surface gold prospects for further deep lode extensions with RC drilling planned to test ‘main zone’ style lodes along strike at Bulgera.

Over at Marymia, the company plans to carry out a full geochemical analysis in July and August to test for precious and base metals as well as lithium and REEs.

 

 

 

This article was developed in collaboration with Norwest Minerals, 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.