This Nomgon ‘Tsagaan Tolgoi’ syncline could be mammoth for the...

This Nomgon ‘Tsagaan Tolgoi’ syncline could be mammoth for the company, take a close look at page 8 of the Noosa Mining Virtual Event presentation on 15/07/20.



Firstly I got thinking about what a syncline actually is. For those of you who don’t know and are interested, this image gives an idea:




In a syncline, the youngest rocks are found in the middle on top and the oldest rocks (i.e coal) are found exposed on the edge. So essentially you can see what lies deep beneath the middle of the basin in the upturned edges.

Coals appropriate for CSG sit within a depth window normally between 300-1000 meters. These shallower coal depths are present near the outer edges of the syncline. Hence the all important red dotted line on the gravity map above, where we can see the current strat holes are being drilled. Recent field mapping has also resulted in an exciting coal outcrop discovery along the southern syncline which shows that coal exists many kilometres away along the syncline edge and it could extend in the CSG depth window around the basin, not just exclusively in Nomgon 1, 2 and 3 (Tsagaan Tolgoi coal outcrop).

This new coal outcrop discovery could be a potential site of one of the planned appraisal strat holes in this sub basin to firm up a larger contingent resource.

It’s also good to see that EXR are running 2D seismic over the eastern portion of the Tsagaan Tolgoi basin to confirm the sediments. The ‘New Maximum potential of Syncline’ could have been discovered with recent field mapping, as old information I’ve come across indicates the sub basin was only thought to be about a third of its current size. ERCE didn’t even note the sub basin in their high graded area for CSG, so I don’t believe it was even included in the 7.6 TCF (risked).

If 2D seismic is good in this eastern portion and a successful strat hole drills gassy thick coal (like in Nomgon 1 & 2), we could see a large contingent resource being booked in this sub basin alone (which by my accounts is 40km+ wide with an outer circumference of up to about 100km). Of course it’s a big ask to have analogous thick gassy coals around the whole basin.

I suspect we’ll get a post-spudding of Nomgon-3 (north western syncline) announcement soon. It could be part of an announcement related to further details of Nomgon-2.

Just my Monday musings. I’m not a CSG expert, just a curious passionate long term investor who believes in EXR and can see the enormous potential being unlocked. I’m enjoying reading the enthusiasm on the threads and I’m always happy to read further insights from others.