Challenging
more efficient exploration
Discovery of new resources needs
enhanced information
• on surface and subsurface geology,
• new concepts of natural resource potential, particularly in underexplored
areas of limited geological knowledge
• projects facilitating the need to span the geosciences and be truly
multidisciplinary.
Global trends and findings
Near mine/brownfields exploration
• During 1996-2008 by reviewing 31 base-
and precious metal discoveries it was found that over 60% of them were
spatially linked to existing or historic mines.
• It was found that, over the period 1950-2013, the average delay between
discovery and production for greenfields copper projects was 18.4 years, versus
15.6 years for brownfields projects.
• The allocation of brownfields budgets was rising from 16% of total spend in
2006 to 29% in 2013. These activities generally being a less expensive and less
risky way to add resources. This outcome has come at the cost of declining
greenfields exploration (down to 40% to 32% over the same period), which may
have longer-term consequences for discovery and development rates.
• An analysis among 182 mineral projects showed that more than 60% of the total
budget for geology was allocated to brownfields near mine and in- mine
exploration activities.
Deep exploration
• Exploration have made the transition
to a different way of exploring, due to an obvious and compelling need to
largely abandon a predominantly surface to near-surface target approach and
embrace deep exploration.
• About 80% of the unrealized ore potential of the Earth’s crust that, is
poorly explored in known mining districts and metallogenic provinces, from
about 300 m below surface down to 2-km depth (and this does not include the
potential of greenfield regions).
• Exploring deeper and under cover may meet rising community and environmental
concerns
Greenfield exploration
• A strong greenfields exploration program is central to the long-term growth
of the industry, as this is the only way of delivering the next major new
mining camp. It is the best solution is to find new, high-quality deposits.
• Genuine greenfields discovery focused on high-quality targets remains the
best long-term option to grow a company.
• Exploration success is not measured simply in terms of the number of deposits
found, but rather the number of high-quality mines built.
Land-use planning
• Dynamic nature of socio-economic
factors can be expressed as concern about the environment, cost of energy,
social license to operate or conflict. In a changing world, these factors are
likely to become increasingly significant
• To an increasing extent, extraction of mineral resources must compete with
other interests
• Documentation and spatial databases of reserves/deposit areas is of
importance for influencing on the future land use.
Exploration: The search for an ore
deposit
Generating successful new projects is
mainly based on available information reviews and new exploration surveys
carried out.
Geology drives ore modelling
• If is often difficult to identify all
of the processes involved in the formation of a deposit and in place of a good
understanding of why mineral deposits occur where they do, mineral explorers
and resource assessor make do with mineral deposit models. The attached figure
displays a workable geo-modeling approach concerning the presence of
interactive ore-forming hydrothermal systems in northern Greece to produce
feasible manto polymetallic and porphyry copper deposits.
• The value of ore deposit models in exploration and resource assessment is
therefore limited when the geology of an area is poorly understood and by the
simplifications inherent in the construction of ore deposit models
• Integration of geological, geochemical, geophysical, spectral data, adds an
essential, holistic, multidisciplinary approach that further enhances the
exploration process.
Mineral exploration challenges for Geological Surveys
• Evaluation of future global minerals demand and supply.
• More detailed evaluations of resource potential in underexplored regions and
revisiting of historic mining regions with new technology and concepts
• Enhance the accessibility to existing data on both primary and secondary
resources to achieve high potential and new mineral deposits (e.g. CRM) taking
also into account competing land-uses
• New 3D/4D modeling capabilities integrating geological, geophysical and
geochemical data, and development and application of innovative assessment
methods will result in improving the understanding of resources and possibly
underpinning the discovery of deep seated deposits.
• Ore classification of primary and secondary resources based on geological
potential approach and estimation
• Develop models for the research and development of unconventional resources
(e.g., small high-grade deposits necessitating reduced investments for their
development, and hence reduced impacts on society, land use and the environment).
EU raw materials sustainability
• Sustainable and resilient exploitation
of Europe’s mineral resources and work towards a secure supply of the EU with
raw materials.
• Integrate innovation and value creation in relation to mineral raw materials
in combination with environmentally sound and resource efficient exploitation
taking into account the required economic, environmental and social conditions.
• Stimulate economic growth while at the same time promoting fairness for all
citizens and a healthy environment.
• Societal, environmental and political values and developments may place
increasing pressure on the availability and exploitation of natural resources,
including mineral raw materials, but also other geological resources.
Challenging targets towards and beyond
2020
• To build a good understanding of
mineral occurrences and evolution of their geological and lithological
environment is main key to explaining and predicting the regional distribution
and exploitability of subsurface resources as well as the associated natural
and anthropogenic physical interactions.
• Improving European regional geological and metallogenic knowledge and
enhancing 3D predictive targeting systems to improve exploration efficiency,
identify and safeguard areas of high mineral resource prospectivity and areas
with development potential taking into account competing land uses and
facilitate the identification of mineral resources at depth.
• Providing estimates of resources classification (discovered and undiscovered)
for specific commodities as well as developing appropriate methods for
reporting reserves and resources of waste rock, mine waste and tailings.
• Identifying the undiscovered resources of specific commodities within Europe,
using appropriate methodologies.
• Producing harmonized transnational metallogenic maps, and new mineral
potential and mineral prediction maps based on common methodologies
• Improving mineral deposit models for under-explored or poorly explored
deposit types in Europe. Develop models for the research and development of
unconventional resources (e.g., small high-grade deposits necessitating reduced
investments for their development, and hence reduced impacts on society, land
use and the environment).
• Bring new methodologies for enhancing exploration success to the market
making it more efficient, less costly and less invasive.
• Business and other stakeholders should be better placed to leverage
investment in innovative solutions for mineral exploration and development.
• Develop the data and tools to facilitate the re-use and recycling of mineral
based waste. Combine with the development of 'mobile' units for the treatment
of limited amounts of materials in order to make this approach really
effective, especially at legacy sites.
• Focus on exploration for commodities challenging environments and new
frontiers, such as energy critical elements, low-carbon technologies and
products, telecommunications, transport, societal well-being including health.
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