Dundas Minerals Limited (ASX: DUN), an Australian gold exploration company focused on advancing precious metal exploration assets across Western Australia, has announced the granting of Mining Lease M24/1004. This significant development for the Capricorn Gold Project, located approximately 40km north of Kalgoorlie, Western Australia, immediately unlocks exploration and development options for the company. The grant of the lease activates Dundas’s option to acquire an 80% interest in the project, with Horizon Gold Limited (ASX: HRZ) retaining a 20% interest, and initiates a nine-month exercise period.
The Capricorn Gold Project hosts a JORC 2012 Inferred Mineral Resource of 25,500 ounces of gold, derived from 659,300 tonnes at 1.2 grams per tonne gold, reported at a 0.5 g/t cut-off. This resource estimate, originally made in 2022 when gold prices were below US$2,000 per ounce, presents significant upside potential in today’s higher gold price environment. Dundas noted that the deposit remains open at depth and along strike to both the north and south, with no systematic drilling beyond 50m to the north or approximately 900m to the south where the Rockland Gold Project commences. Importantly, Capricorn has never been subject to prior modern mining, offering a clear advantage for future mining studies.
Dundas Minerals interprets the Capricorn deposit to be situated on the same north-south mineralised structural corridor as its recently exercised Rockland Gold Project, located around 900 metres to the south. The Rockland project has defined an approximately 1km trend of high-grade gold mineralisation, which is open along strike towards Capricorn, creating a compelling untested zone of over 500 metres between the two deposits. The company plans to immediately advance exploration at Capricorn, with an RC drilling programme already underway to target strike and depth extensions and evaluate the potential to link the Capricorn and Rockland mineralisation. An updated resource estimate will be commissioned following new drilling.
