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  • Report on the activities of the administrative and technical sections in the Katherine-Darwin area, to April, 1954. A brief account is given of geological and geophysical operations. The results of prospecting and field work are summarised.

  • Prospecting was carried out along favourable structures in an area of granite and sediments. One uranium prospect was discovered near the Yenberrie wolfram field but appears to be very small and low in grade. Some general notes on the geology of the area were also made.

  • Surveys and investigations associated with the search for uranium deposits were confined mainly to the Darwin-Katherine region of the Northern Territory. Other surveys included - (1) Aero scintillometer survey of part of the Radium Hill area for the South Australian Government; (2) Test flights and surveys with a scintillometer mounted in a helicopter. The results of the airborne surveys at Radium Hill were given to the South Australian Department of Mines in the form of anomalies marked on aerial photographs. It is understood that that Department is preparing and issuing a map showing the anomalies. The results of the tests with the helicopter have already been issued in a separate report entitled - "Records 1953 No. 106 - Radioactive Surveying from a Helicopter" by J. Daly. The remainder of this progress report will be devoted to the search in the Darwin-Katherine district.

  • Abstract for initial submission; see Geocat 71429 for conference paper version

  • The occurrence of molybdenite deposits near Yetholme has been known for many years. The most important deposits are close to the eastern boundary of Ph. Yetholme, Co. Roxburgh. The deposits have been worked in a small way for molybdenite at several places, have been examined by several geologists, and have been investigated by two of the major mining companies. The result of this work has shown that although considerable tonnages are available, the molybdenite content is too low to make mining attractive. It is not proposed to describe the geology, mining excavations, and other factors affecting the field in this report since that has already been done in several previous reports. It is the purpose of this report, however, to point out that the Yetholme deposits contain a considerable amount of scheelite and may well warrant large scale mining for this now important ore of tungsten.

  • Abstract tittled "New frontier exploration opportunities on Australia's southwest margin" to accompany presentation at the SEAPEX conference 2011.

  • Report on the activities of the administrative and technical sections in the Katherine-Darwin area, to September, 1954. A brief account is given of geophysical operations. The results of prospecting and development work are summarised.

  • A recent Geoscience Australia geological sampling survey in the Great Australian Bight has provided new evidence for the presence of potential oil-prone source rocks in the Bight Basin. Exploratory drilling in the Bight Basin has historically concentrated on the inboard margins of the basin. Apart from Woodside's Gnarlyknots-1A well, which was drilled in the Ceduna Sub-basin in 2003, only the more proximal parts of the Cretaceous depositional systems of the basin have ever been sampled by drilling. Previous Geoscience Australia work in the Bight Basin predicted the presence of potential source rock intervals at different stratigraphic levels, including mid-Cretaceous marine or marine-influenced sediments whose source rock character was predicted to improve farther basinward. The sampling survey targeted an area at the seaward edge of the Eyre Terrace where canyon formation, slumping and faulting has exposed this Albian-Santonian section. Samples recovered from this area include a suite of carbonaceous marine siltstones and mudstones. Preliminary organic geochemical analysis has shown that some samples of Late Cenomanian-Early Turonian age recovered from the Eyre Terrace have excellent source rock potential, with high organic carbon contents (2.1-6.2% TOC) and the potential to generate liquid hydrocarbons (HI values ranging from 274 to 479 mg hydrocarbons/gTOC). These are the best source rock results yet from the Bight Basin, and demonstrate that targeting the right part of the depositional system is vital for understanding hydrocarbon source potential. 2D petroleum systems modelling of two transects from the Ceduna Sub-basin using source-specific multi-component kinetic parameters, suggests that generation and expulsion from the Late Cenomanian-Early Turonian potential source rock occurred during the mid-Campanian to Recent, resulting in potentially significant accumulations of both liquid and gaseous hydrocarbons within overlying sandstones of the Turonian-Santonian Tiger and/or latest Santonian-Maastrichtian Hammerhead supersequences.

  • As a result of the field activities of the Bureau during 1953 regional geological maps have been prepared for the Rum Jungle district, the Katherine-Edith River district and the Coronation Hill-Goodparla district, which cover the Katherine, Lewin Springs and Mt. Todd 1 mile military sheets and portions of the Marrakai, Mt. Tolmer, Batchelor, Tumbling Waters, Goodparla North, Goodparla South and Mt. Evelyn sheets. Detailed geological and geophysical reports and plans have also been prepared for all known radioactive mineral prospects, costeaning and diamond drilling has been undertaken to test some of the prospects and inspectional reports have been made on practically all airborne scintillometer anomalies located during surveys in 1952, and on some of those found during 1953. Prospecting operations have also been undertaken. A summary of the activities of the Bureau during 1953 and the results achieved is given in the following pages, and further details can be obtained from reports mentioned in the list of references.

  • Cenozoic basins of the Lake Frome region in South Australia host the Beverley in-situ recovery uranium mine as well as the Honeymoon, Four Mile, Oban, and Goulds Dam deposits and recently discovered Pepegoona prospect several kilometres to the north of Beverley. Most deposits occur in organic-rich sands and silts of the Eocene Eyre Formation or Miocene Namba Formation (Beverley). However, the recognition of Eromanga Basin host rocks at the Four Mile West deposit (Heathgate Resources, pers. comm., 2009) extends the age range of host stratigraphic units into the Mesozoic. We define the Frome Uranium Province as the 3-dimensional volume encompassing known and potentially mineralised areas of Cenozoic and Mesozoic basins in the Lake Frome region, constrained on three sides by Proterozoic inliers (Fig. 1). The northern extent of the metallogenic province is unknown; recent discovery of anomalous uranium in Cenozoic sediments near Moomba (Crescent Gold Ltd, September 2009, www.crescentgold.com) points to the potential of the Lake Eyre Basin for uranium mineralisation well to the north of Lake Frome.