Alligator Rivers (ARUP)
Alligator Rivers Uranium Province (ARUP), Northern Territories
Project and Tenement Location Map
The Alligator Rivers Uranium Province contains multiple uranium targets in a well-defined high-grade regional uranium bearing zone, which includes the Caramal uranium resource bearing 6.5 million pounds of uranium at a high-grade of 3,100ppm. It is nearby to key uranium deposits, Jabiluka: 349Mlb at 5,300ppm U3O8 and Ranger: past production approximately 300Mlb and Ranger 3 deeps – 96Mlb at 2,850ppm U3O8.
Comprehensive re-evaluation of the regional and local geology has enhanced our understanding of the stratigraphic and structural relationships to allow a more targeted focus.
This has highlighted a broad prospective zone running from the western Beatrice Project, through the eastern portion of the Tin Camp Creek project and into the Nabarlek North project area.
Tenements within the latter have recently been granted giving Alligator in excess of 1,140km2 of active tenure in Australia’s premier Uranium district and new exploration ground adjacent to the high grade U40 Uranium Copper Gold Prospect.
Current Exploration focus:
The Nabarlek North Project represents a highly prospective under-explored region within the ARUP (Fig 1), typified by the presence of an exhumed Proterozoic unconformity and enough cover sediments to mask bedrock radiometric signatures and discouraged past exploration. The Project is located less than 7km north of the historic Nabarlek uranium mine which produced 24Mlb of U3O8 at an average grade of 1.84%4. The U40 Prospect, located 200m south of Alligator’s southern tenement boundary, has historically reported grades of up to 6.3m @ 7.23% U3O8 demonstrating high-grade occurrences proximal to the Nabarlek North Project.
Alligator believes that armed with the right datasets and a predictive geological model we will be able to take advantage of the simpler, inexpensive exploration techniques required to make a discovery where cover is thin and there isn’t the impediment of thick Kombolgie Sandstone. That sandstone has previously been seen as a necessary ingredient to past exploration in Arnhem Land, due to its associated unconformity. Alligator will also be able to benefit from the excellent accessibility afforded to working in open flat environs beyond the sandstone escarpments. Alligator will not only be exploring the possibility of extensions of the U40 Prospect mineralised system into the Nabarlek North tenement package, but also be pursuing identification of new uranium systems further north where Cahill Formation is now interpreted under as little as 1m of cover.
The Company is focussing its exploration targeting strategy around the following key criteria:
- Presence of Cahill Formation which hosts all known uranium deposits in the Alligator Rivers Uranium Province.
- Existence of major low-angle structures that would have promoted long-lived fluid flow from above and below the Kombolgie unconformity.
- Identification of trace elements associated with the presence of uranium including REE, PGEs and certain Pb isotope ratios.
- Chlorite and haematite alteration related to uranium mineralisation that has a broader footprint.
The region remains heavily under explored in comparison to the analogous Athabasca basin highlighting increased potential for world class discoveries. See comparison diagram below:
Approved Exploration MMPs
