Soil sampling uncovers large uranium anomaly at Oceana Lithium’s Napperby project. Pic: Getty Images
Soil sampling defines sweet uranium anomaly at Oceana’s Napperby project
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- Oceana Lithium soil sampling defines large uranium anomaly at Napperby project in the NT
- Hyperspectral data supports interpretation that ‘roll-front’ style uranium mineralisation is present
- Further mapping and sampling to define targets for first pass drilling
Special Report: Oceana Lithium’s soil sampling has delineated a large 4.5km long by up to 700m wide uranium anomaly at its Napperby project in the Northern Territory.
Napperby sits within the highly prospective Arunta province that is endowed with some of the most prospective rocks for lithium, rare earths and uranium mineralisation in the Northern Territory.
Oceana Lithium (ASX:OCN) adds that the Paleoproterozoic Wangala and Ennugan Mountains granite plutons, which are almost fully encapsulated within project leases EL32836 and ELA32841, are known to be anomalously enriched in a range of elements and show outstanding uranium/thorium ratios.
The uranium anomaly was delineated by a soil geochemistry infill sampling program completed during the December quarter in the southeast corner of EL32836 to better define and understand the lithium anomalies highlighted by the 2022 soil sampling program.
The large uranium soil anomaly. Pic: Oceana Lithium
Uranium soil anomaly
The uranium anomaly, which is mostly covered by Quaternary sediments and residual soils, features relatively low absolute values of between 500ppm and 3860ppm uranium though this is the result of using mobile metal ion sampling techniques that do not crush or pulverise samples.
As such the uranium values do not represent the absolute values of elements that are of interest but the relative differences of values within a given data set.
To top it off, modelling and interpretation of the available hyperspectral data by HyVista supports the company’s interpretation that ‘roll-front’ style uranium mineralisation is present within the anomaly.
HyVista’s work also defined a number of potential targets for sulphide mineralisation at Napperby.
Further activity
With the Northern Territory field season about to start, OCN plans to carry out another round of field work to map and sample the uranium anomaly.
This is aimed at defining targets for first pass drilling.
This article was developed in collaboration with Oceana Lithium, 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.
