The new owners of South Australia’s renowned Mt Gunson copper-gold project say they believe there is significant potential to uplift its known resource base at a time global demand continues to growth for both ‘green economy’ commodities.

Perth-based Coda Minerals said there were now three separate pathways evolving to develop Mt Gunson’s mineralisation and future corporate structure.

The Company has set a goal of 1.5 million tonnes of copper equivalent as it eyes taking the project to the public capital raising platform and ASX listing in 2020.

Coda was spun out as a public unlisted company from former owner, Gindalbie Metals and is solely focused on Mt Gunson’s development.

Coda’s Manager – Economics and Geology, Matt Weber said that Mt Gunson – just to the west of OZ Minerals’ new Carrapateena copper-gold mine – had already had significant work done by Coda and former owners.

Coda’s new focus was on the Emmie Bluff exploration target – only defined in June 2019 – within the Arcoona Corridor.

This has the potential to substantially add to Mt Gunson’s existing JORC Indicated resource of 280,000t of contained copper equivalent held in the Windabout and MG14 deposits further to the south.

“Our drill program at Emmie Bluff will take Coda to a 70per cent stake in Mt Gunson during the opening half of 2020 with a cumulative spend on the project by us by then of around AU$6.6 million,” said Mr Weber.

“We will then continue the farm-in as we free carry our partner, Terrace Mining, up to a total spend of AU$8.62million at which point a Joint Venture will be formed between the two parties to carry the project forward through feasibility.

“Our work to date shows Mt Gunson clearly capable of producing separate and saleable copper and cobalt concentrates. The Emmie Bluff flowsheet to date shows that mineralisation compatible with pre-existing work.

“High priority IOCG targets there have also been identified by International Geoscience,” added Mr Weber.

The Company believes that these have a big potential scale capable of delivering 1.5Mt copper Eq resource.

The Emmie Bluff Deeps target shows connectivity with BHP’s recent Oak Dam West discovery.

Coda aims to drill priority targets at Emmie Bluff over 2020/2021. The deposit appears open to the southeast.