News First data released from National Drilling Initiatives South Nicholson campaign

The first data from one of the most promising exploration frontiers in Australia is now available from Geoscience Australia.

Minister for Resources, Water and Northern Australia Keith Pitt has announced the release of initial data from the National Drilling Initiatives Carrara 1 deep stratigraphic drill hole from the Carrara Sub-basin at the Annual Geoscience Exploration Seminar (AGES) in Alice Springs.

The Carrara Sub-basin was discovered as a result of a seismic survey of the South Nicholson Basin in the Barkly Tableland region of the Northern Territory in 2017.

It was one of the most significant discoveries made during the first phase of the $225 million Exploring for the Future program.

The downhole logging data will be available from the new Borehole Completion Report tool on the Exploring for the Future and MinEx CRC web portals.

This will include downhole wireline logs, on-site drilling logs and photographs of core samples taken from the 1751-metre-deep hole.

It will eventually include a diverse collection of datasets, including detailed geochemical, rock properties and fluid inclusion data, x-ray powder diffraction analysis and geochronology on over 350 samples of the recovered core.

Geoscience Australia's Minerals, Energy and Groundwater Division Chief Dr Andrew Heap said the release of this data, just four months after the completion of drilling, would encourage industry to explore this frontier region.

"Preliminary findings from this drill hole indicate that the Carrara Sub-basin hosts rocks that may be equivalent to those that host the Mount Isa deposit, which is one of the largest lead, zinc and silver deposits in the world," Dr Heap said.

"The drill hole also indicates the sediments are prospective for energy resources and show geological affinities with the Beetaloo Sub-basin, one of the most promising shale gas resources globally.

"Geoscience Australia and our project partners will analyse and interpret this drill hole data over the next 12 months and publish our own expert analysis, but we wanted to get this information in the hands of industry as soon as possible so explorers could use it as the basis for their own campaigns.

"While its early days, we are incredibly excited about what this data is telling us about the potential of the Carrara Sub-basin as Australias next Beetaloo or Mount Isa."