Pacific: PNG Seabed mineral results good news for whole region
Updated
The latest drilling results from Papua New Guinea's undersea gold and copper reserves are so significant that they will be seen as a major landmark in world mining opening up a new industry that will stretch from Papua New Guinea across to Solomon Islands, Fiji and Tonga. That's the conclusion of David Heydon, President and CEO of Nautilus Minerals, the world's leading undersea mining company, after announcing the drilling results in Vancouver, Canada. In the past six months Nautilus has discovered four major new seafloor deposits in Papua New Guinea waters and conducted 140 days of sea-based electromagnetic survey work and ocean-floor drilling. David Heydon says the results of the drilling program mean plans for Papua New Guinea to be the first country in the world to begin commercial sea-bed mining are on-track.
Presenter: Jemima Garrett
Speakers: David Heydon, President and CEO of Nautilus Minerals
HEYDON: The drilling we've conducted is a world first, we've used robotic drill rigs that we've lowered to the deep oceans of the sea floor and we've drilled this deposit called Solwara 1 in Papua New Guinea's territorial waters. What it's done is it's confirmed that this deposit has high grade gold and copper has extent to the sea floor, it extends down at least 19 metres thickness, it's very large, and we believe it will be in history seen as one of the most significant discoveries in the last 25 years of the mining industry. It's significance will be as the equivalent of the first oil and gas well ever drilled. Of course we've now gotten to a point where one-third of the world's oil and gas comes from offshore. We see that'll be the case for copper and zinc in the future as well.
GARRETT: So how does it fit in to your discoveries you've already made there, and how significant will this be for Papua New Guinea?
HEYDON: Well this is opening up in our view the whole of the western Pacific. These deposits we believe you'll be able to locate from Tonga, Fiji, the Solomons, Papua New Guinea and heading north up towards Japan, and we've shown that we can find these and locate these. It will open up a whole new resource for these countries, a resource that currently has no value because no one has demonstrated you can find them efficiently and then of course proceed to mining them after environmental studies. It's impact will be enormous, it'll add jobs, technology, we see Papua New Guinea as the start of this new industry, just like oil and gas I defer to again, Papua New Guinea will be like the Houston of the offshore oil and gas industry bringing new technologies and new skills to their country.
GARRETT: Now at this stage is it possible to put a dollar figure on what you've found so far in Papua New Guinea?
HEYDON: In terms we'll have a resource statement out by the end of the year, but in our view it's incredibly significant. One of the keys of working the ocean floor as you can actually aggragate the deposits, you can mine out one area and then move the ship to the next and mine out a second and third and fourth, whereas on land you need to find a resource in one big blob to justify development, so it's a totally new concept of mining. We're now moving into detailed engineering and we're completing our environmental studies, all of which will determine the commercial extent of this. But in our view it's starting a whole new fresh industry like offshore oil and gas and the significance should not be overlooked of the significance to not only the country of Papua New Guinea, the western Pacific, but of course the world as far as supplying new resources.
GARRETT: What do these new finds mean in terms of your plans to be the first company in the world to actually mine these sea floor deposits?
HEYDON: Well it confirms that we're on track. Nautilus's major shareholders compose some of the biggest mining companies in the world, they've invested in us to investigate this new opportunity. It's confirmed that we're on track, that we have the technology to find them. We've had some of the most eminent scientists and biolgists and oceanographers in the world out on the vessel. We've had a 20-million dollar exploration program out there demonstrating that these areas, the species in these areas are widespread. That study is doing many things, it's expanding people's knowledge of science and the deep oceans. Clearly it will bring another resource category into these countries. It's opened up Papua New Guinea again as a whole exploration regime. Papua New Guinea is reasonably maturely explored on land, many companies have explored there. But many countries like Tonga, Fiji and Papua New Guinea and the Solomons actually control more sea floor than they do land. And once again those resources haven't been studied in detail and their economic potential is now just being realised through this work that Nautilus is doing in Papua New Guinea.
GARRETT: At this stage what can you tell us about the likely date that you might start mining the sea floor in Papua New Guinea?
HEYDON: Well our aim is to have our environmental impact study out next year, initially submitted to the Papua New Guinea government in a public document. We're on track in our engineering design. Our aim would be to be in production in the year 2010, which is not very far off by the time we start construction. Of course that's subject to permitting by the Papua New Guinea government, we look forward to working with them on that. But it's not too far out, it's very close, we're well funded and we're gearing up with detailed engineering at this point.
