Year 3 relinquishment report for EL 24810 Plenty Highway for the period 2 August 2006 to 1 August 2009

Abstract

The Plenty Highway Project is located in the Plenty River area about 125km northeast of Alice Springs. The project was formerly part of two contiguous tenements that covered approximately 1,200km2 of the Tertiary Waite and Huckitta Basins within the Proterozoic Arunta Block, which are prospective for palaeo drainage hosted uranium mineralisation. The Plenty Highway passes through the south of the Plenty Highway project area. The prospective areas within the tenement are topographically flat and are covered by scrub and grassland. The project area covers part of the Tertiary Waite and Huckitta Basins which are relatively shallow sedimentary basins; the central portions of which were probably lakes during most of the time of deposition of their sediments. The basins were fed from both the Harts Range metamorphic rocks in the south and by various channels that drain areas of Proterozoic granitic and metamorphic rocks to the north. The sedimentary sequence within the basin is dominated by clays and sandy clays, with lesser amounts of sands. Lignite and evaporite horizons are also present. The sediments were subject to slight uplift during the late Pliocene and the upper parts of the sequence have been eroded in part. The sequence is poorly known, with the approximate 1,200km2 of basin within the project areas having been tested by only about 15 drill-holes. Within the Plenty Highway tenement basement was reached in only one hole and the basin is known to be in excess of 200m vertical depth at it's deepest point. Early stratigraphic information was obtained by the BMR, which drilled two holes into the basin during the 1960s. Alcoa explored the basins for uranium during 1979 and 1980. Alcoa drilled 71 holes to maximum depths of 200m for a total of 6,260 metres. Of these holes, six were drilled within the area of EL 24810 and a further six within that the adjacent tenement EL 25378. Significant uranium intersections were only achieved in four holes, drilled outside Hale Energy's project areas. The best intersection, at a depth of 104m, was of 45ppm U3O8 within a reducing horizon of pyritic carbonaceous silt. NB: The HoistEM survey and subsequent air core drill programme completed by Hale Energy in 2007 covers the retained portion of the tenement only. A review of all open file data together with the recent Hale Energy drilling was completed during Year 3. The review led to a surrender of 118 graticular blocks peripheral to the main area of interest to reduce costs and meet DRDPIFR statutory requirements. No further work is recommended on the relinquished portion of the tenement.