Barton Gold Holdings Ltd (ASX:BGD, OTCQB:BGDFF, FRA:BGD3) has started a new diamond drilling program at its Tunkillia gold project in South Australia, with two rigs now operating on site as the company pushes toward ore reserves, a pre-feasibility study and a mining lease application by the end of 2026.
The diamond campaign, totalling about 3,000 metres, will run alongside the company’s ongoing Phase 2 reverse circulation program, which is planned for around 30,000 metres. Together, the programs are designed to upgrade resources, refine pit designs and build the technical dataset needed for the next stage of project development.
“The Tunkillia OSS demonstrated the financial and capital leverage available to large-scale bulk processing operations, with the major advantage of a higher-grade ‘Starter Pit’ that can pay back development costs 2 times over in the first year – assuming A$5,000/oz gold and A$50/oz silver prices. At current gold and silver prices, Tunkillia would be modelled to produce over $1 billion operating profit in the first year, and over $2 billion operating profit in the first two years," Barton MD Alexander Scanlon said.
“Our recent ‘Phase 1’ Resource upgrade drilling results further confirmed the mineralisation behind these compelling economics; we are therefore now executing the balance of Tunkillia development drilling programs on an expedited timeline, targeting declared JORC Ore Reserves, a robust PFS, and a Mining Lease application by the end of 2026.
Diamond drilling aimed at technical de-risking
Drilling is focused on expanding Tunkillia’s geotechnical and metallurgical databases.
That work is expected to support JORC 2012 mineral resource estimate upgrades, open pit design optimisation and more detailed recovery and production modelling.
In practical terms, the program is targeting the information needed to move the project from resource definition toward mine planning. Geotechnical drilling will help the company better understand rock conditions for pit wall design, while metallurgical drilling is expected to provide fresh samples for processing and recovery test work.
The company has engaged Foraco Drilling for the program, and with two diamond rigs now active alongside an RC rig, Barton says it has 3 rigs advancing development work at Tunkillia.
“We now have three drill rigs advancing Tunkillia as quickly as possible. Following the submission of our Mining Lease application, we will expedite Tunkillia’s project finance discussions and work with all key stakeholders to bring Tunkillia online as soon as possible,” Scanlon said.
RC program targets higher-confidence resource categories
The diamond work follows Barton’s earlier Phase 1 resource upgrade drilling, which included about 18,900 metres of RC drilling across the S1 and S2 pit areas.
That first phase returned a series of broad and higher-grade gold intersections and is aimed at converting mineralisation in those areas into JORC Measured and Indicated categories.
Phase 2 RC drilling is set to extend that upgrade work across the rest of the mineralisation captured in the project’s optimised scoping study pit shell, targeting conversion to the Indicated category.
This matters because higher-confidence resource categories are a key step toward declaring ore reserves and underpinning more detailed economic and mine planning studies.
Development pathway now centres on PFS and mining lease
Barton is accelerating the Tunkillia development timeline following the project’s optimised scoping study, which outlined a large-scale gold and silver operation.
The current drilling programs are part of an expedited pathway toward declared JORC ore reserves, completion of a robust pre-feasibility study and lodgement of a mining lease application by year-end 2026.
Once the mining lease application is submitted, the company plans to advance project financing discussions and continue engagement with stakeholders to support a development decision.
What’s next
Investors can expect more updates on both the ongoing Phase 2 RC program and the new diamond drilling campaign as results are generated.
Near-term news flow is likely to focus on resource upgrades, additional metallurgical and geotechnical outcomes, and how those feed into pit optimisation, reserve definition and the broader pre-feasibility study.