Final surrender report for EL 23391

Abstract

The Arunta Project is located approximately 250 km NNW of Alice Springs in the Northern Territory. The North Arunta Province is dominated by a series of sulphidic Palaeoproterozoic sedimentary sequences intruded by granite plutons and mafic sills. Quaternary and Tertiary cover conceals large areas of bedrock in the area however the region has seen exploration for a variety of commodities including gold, base metals, iron ore, uranium and diamonds. Work by Proto Resources & Investments Ltd on EL23391 has highlighted the prospectivity of 6 priority GEOTEM targets within the licence area. However, for reasons related to the current market downturn the licence is to be surrendered. Exploration completed during the current period of tenure has been limited to a desktop review of the selected conductive targets identified from the Discovery 2004 GEOTEM survey. No field exploration activities have occurred on the licence area. The Arunta Province has been explored for gold, uranium, rare earths and base metals by various companies. The province is considered prospective for a number of base metal mineralisation styles from Proterozoic stratabound Cu-Pb-Zn to skarn-related Cu-Au and Pb-Zn-Cu and acid volcanic Cu-Pb-Zn. The province hosts a number of significant base metals deposits including; Jervois 6.1Mt @ 2.1% Cu, Prospect D 3.2Mt @ 0.6% Cu & 0.2% Ni, Oonagalabi 25Mt @ 0.5% Cu & 1% Zn and Home of Bullion 0.13Mt @ 7.1% Cu, 5% Zn & 2% Pb. The area also hosts a number of sub-economic occurrences of gold, tin, tungsten, tantalum, mica, nickel, chromite and semi-precious stones. In terms of the exploration within EL23391, Discovery Nickel Ltd acquired GEOTEM data over the southern portion of the licence area which defined 16 conductive targets during 2004. In the time since Proto acquired the Arunta Project from Discovery in late 2006 they have commissioned a full review of the GEOTEM data by GeoDiscovery Group which has allowed the selection of 6 priority targets within the licence area. No ground work has as yet been completed on the licence.