1. National mineral potential for sediment-hosted zinc-lead mineral systems in Australia Version 1.0
- Author
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A., Ford, J., Cloutier, D., Huston, M., Doublier, A., Schofield, K., Waltenberg, P., de Caritat, G., Fraser, E., Beyer, E., Bastrakov, and K., Czarnota
- Subjects
sediment-hosted base metals ,Mineral potential ,Data mining and knowledge discovery ,Earth Sciences ,EFTF – Exploring for the Future ,Australia’s Resources Framework ,Published_External ,mineral systems - Abstract
Australian sediment-hosted mineral systems are important sources of base metals and critical minerals that are vital to delivering Australia’s low-carbon economy. In Australia, sediment-hosted resources account for ~82% and ~86% of the total zinc (Zn) and lead (Pb) resources respectively. Given their significance to the Australian economy, four national-scale mineral potential models for sediment-hosted Zn-Pb mineral systems have been developed: clastic-dominated siliciclastic carbonate, clastic-dominated siliciclastic mafic, Mississippi Valley-type and Irish-type. In addition to the potential for Zn-Pb mineralisation, the uncertainty related to data availability has been examined. The mineral potential models were created using a mineral systems-based approach where mappable criteria have been used to assess the prospectivity of each system. Each model has been derived from a large volume of precompetitive geoscience data. The clastic-dominated siliciclastic carbonate mineral potential model predicts 92% of known deposits and occurrences within 15.5% of the area, the clastic-dominated siliciclastic mafic mineral potential model predicts 85% of deposits and occurrences within 27% of the area, and the Mississippi Valley-type mineral potential model predicts 66% of known deposits and occurrences within 31% of the area. Each model successfully predict the location of major sediment-hosted Zn-Pb deposits while highlighting new areas of elevated prospectivity in under-explored regions of Australia, reducing the exploration search space by up to 85% for sediment-hosted Zn-Pb mineral systems.
- Published
- 2023
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