FMG eyes base metals exploration
Fortescue Metals Group is dipping its toe into base metals exploration, winning a co-funded drilling grant from the State Government for a greenfields project near its West Pilbara iron ore project.
According to the Department of Mines and Petroleum, the funding is for drilling at Fortescue’s Trifecta base metals project, where the company is searching for a Mt Isa-style deposit containing lead, zinc, copper, silver and gold.
DMP records note the tenements sit along the Cane River, about 130km east of the Exmouth Gulf. Fortescue pegged the ground in 2012.
The miner was one of 37 companies to secure funding under the State Government’s Exploration Incentive Scheme, announced yesterday.
The drilling campaign is not Fortescue’s first foray outside its core iron ore business. In 2008, it launched a push to add coal, picking up acreage in New Zealand. It added coal tenements in Queensland to its portfolio in 2010 before abandoning the coal push last year when commodity prices fell.
In 2011, Fortescue also applied for tenements in South Australia, picking up ground between OZ Minerals’ Prominent Hill copper-gold mine and BHP Billiton’s Olympic Dam project.
Fortescue still holds the tenements, though exploration is still understood to be at an early stage.
Fortescue remains one of WA’s biggest mining landholders, and also holds exploration ground in the Fraser Ranges and around Kalgoorlie.
