Exploring for the Future - Bulk density data from NDI Carrara 1, South Nicholson region, Australia Destructive Analysis Report

Exploring for the Future (EFTF) is an Australian Government program led by Geoscience Australia, in partnership with state and Northern Territory governments. The first phase of the EFTF program (2016-2020) aimed to drive industry investment in resource exploration in frontier regions of northern Australia by providing new precompetitive data and information about their energy, mineral and groundwater resource potential. One of the key discoveries of the first phase of the Exploring for the Future program was the identification of a large sedimentary depocentre in the South Nicholson region, an underexplored area straddling north-eastern Northern Territory and north-western Queensland. This depocentre, up to 8 km deep, was termed the ‘Carrara Sub-basin’ by Geoscience Australia. It is interpreted to contain thick sequences of Proterozoic rocks, broadly equivalent to rocks of the greater McArthur Basin (Northern Territory) and northern Lawn Hill Platform and Mount Isa Province (Queensland), known to be highly prospective for sediment-hosted base metals and unconventional hydrocarbons. In order to gain insights into the resource potential of the Carrara Sub-basin, the South Nicholson National Drilling Initiative (NDI) Carrara 1 stratigraphic drillhole was completed in late 2020, as a collaboration between Geoscience Australia, the Northern Territory Geological Survey (NTGS) and the MinEx CRC . NDI Carrara 1 is the first drillhole to intersect the, as yet, undifferentiated Proterozoic rocks of the Carrara Sub-Basin. NDI Carrara 1 is located on the western flanks of the Carrara Sub-basin on the South Nicholson Seismic line (17GA-SN1), reaching a total depth of 1751 mGL, intersecting ca. 630 m of Cambrian Georgina Basin overlying ca. 1100 m of Proterozoic carbonates, black shales and minor siliciclastics . Geoscience Australia is undertaking a range of investigations on the lithology, stratigraphy and geotechnical properties of NDI Carrara 1 based on wireline data, as well as undertaking a range of analyses of over 400 physical samples recovered through the entire core. This report presents new data from bulk density measurements carried out on selected rock samples as part of this comprehensive analytical program.