Right Resources puts tungsten twist on historic NSW goldfields

Detailed summary

Right Resources is chasing a gold and tungsten double in NSW’s historic Tumbarumba goldfields, armed with promising assays, early metallurgy and modern exploration.

More than a century after gold prospectors peppered the valleys of southern New South Wales with shafts, picks and shovels, ASX-listed Right Resources has returned to the historic Tumbarumba goldfields with a rather more sophisticated arsenal and a potentially valuable new metal in its sights.

Gold may have been the prize that lured the old-timers to the district; however, the company believes the district could also be hiding a sizeable tungsten opportunity, with the critical mineral prized for its hardness, heat resistance and applications in defence, advanced manufacturing and engineering.

Notably, Right Resources is deliberately targeting opportunities where two or more commodities might be mined from the same operation, giving it more than one string to its economic bow. Should gold come along for the ride with tungsten, the precious metal could eventually provide valuable credits to help keep production costs in check.

And while the early prospectors relied on sharp eyes, strong backs and luck, the company is bringing university researchers, sophisticated geochemistry and modern metallurgical science to a district whose geological secrets may have remained hidden in plain sight.

Local folklore even has it that enterprising miners maintained phantom claims across the Victorian border, allegedly passing off NSW gold as Victorian production to dodge the taxman. Whether the tale has grown taller with time is anybody’s guess, but it adds colour to a region where the pursuit of precious metals has long inspired ingenuity.

Today, managing director Graham Howard is applying that ingenuity to identifying gold and tungsten mineralisation, securing prospective ground without paying a king’s ransom and tackling geology, metallurgy and permitting before committing heavily to drilling.

For Howard, the return to Tumbarumba is something of a homecoming. As a university student, he used to venture into the district to pan for gold, hoping to turn a few specks of the yellow metal…

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