Fields of gold: Victoria's huge new find By Di Bain for PM
A geological survey of Victoria has uncovered a new golden triangle, north of the state's traditional goldfields, near Ballarat.
The resource manager at GeoScience Victoria, Paul McDonald, says there could be enough gold in the new field to double the state's historical output.
"We've found that there's over 70 million ounces of gold," he said.
"The amount of gold produced in Victoria over the last 150 years is about 80 million ounces, and that's found in rock sort of poking out of the ground.
"And we've identified the same set of rocks heading north, what we call undercover of some Murray Basin sediments and the same rocks exist, so the potential for the same amount of gold exists in those rocks.
"In today's pricing, gold is around about $1,150 an ounce, so times that by 70 million and I think it would be up around sort of $80 billion or so."
Mr McDonald says the new golden triangle is located north of the old gold rush towns, and could lead to a new gold rush in Victoria.
"If you think of Ballarat and Bendigo and Stawell, so the traditional sort of goldfields, the new goldfield towns could be Swan Hill down to Hamilton and across to Shepparton," he said.
