Barton Gold Initiates Sterilisation Drilling Program At Tunkillia Project in SA

Barton Gold (ASX: BGD) (OTCQB: BGDFF) has commenced a sterilisation drilling program at its Tunkillia project in South Australia.

Drilling has been designed to test potential locations for key project infrastructure including waste dumps, tailings storage facilities, and a processing plant to ensure they are not sited over potentially valuable mineralisation.

An optimised scoping study (OSS) released in May 2025 outlined a compelling development project at Tunkillia combining scale and rapid capital payback, with a pre-feasibiity study (PFS) now underway to support a mining lease application and financing.

The PFS will feature multiple work programs including an expanded Phase 2 campaign comprising 60,000 metres of reverse circulation drilling and 3,000m of diamond work scheduled for September.

Starter-Pit Model

Notably, the project’s S1 starter pit was modelled to yield 206,000 ounces of gold and 491,000oz silver at a cash cost of $997/oz to produce over $800 million in operating cash.

The S1 and S2 pits are expected to produce a combined 365,000oz of gold, 923,000oz silver and $1.7 billion in operating free cash during the first 27 months (assuming current commodity prices).

The proceeds will repay Barton’s upfront development expenditure more than four times over during this period.

“We have recently completed over 57,000m of Resource upgrade drilling at Tunkillia, with positive surprises in some zones offering material upside potential—we look forward to sharing assays and sesource updates in due course,” managing director Alexander Scanlon said.

“In the meantime, we continue advancing our geotechnical, metallurgical, and infrastructure planning programs in parallel, which includes sterilisation drilling at various proposed sites for key infrastructure.”

Recent Tunkillia Drilling

A total of 520 reverse circulation and diamond holes for 57,653 metres was recently completed at Tunkillia as part of Phase 1 and Phase 2 campaigns with the aim of upgrading mineralisation identified in the OSS to the Measured and Indicated categories.

Interim analysis of Phase 1 assays identified the potential to extend the project’s total mineralisation, increase the mineral resource estimate and improve the grade, profile and classification of a larger proportion of starter pit mineralisation than was originally planned.

The Measured and Indicated material is expected to be converted to proven and probable ore reserves in the PFS (subject to technical assessment) and confirm high-confidence in Barton’s accelerated cash flow profile to underwrite development finance.

“Given the modelled economics of Tunkillia’s large-scale gold and silver production profile, we are advancing it toward development as fast as possible, [and] aim to publish our PFS during Q1 CY27, followed by a Mining Lease application,” Mr Scanlon said.