The Australian Minister for Innovation, Industry Science and Research has announced that the proposed ‘Deep Exploration Technologies CRC’ will receive A$28 million of funding under the Cooperative Research Centres program. The CRC has as its mission deep ore discovery, by opening up both greenfields and brownfields search space, through quicker, safer and more effective exploration at depth and through cover. It will undertake research in three programs including: the development of radical, new hard rock drilling techniques, research into down-hole and onsite surface technologies that enable data acquisition in real time, and improving imagery of the rock volume at depth. AMIRA, an independent association of mineral companies, helped carry out the groundwork for the application.

AMIRA managed the preparation of the bid, which was funded by a group of companies, including CSIRO, which provided seed funding of some A$560,000 over two years. In total the CRC will have a budget of some A$100 million over eight years.

This initiative was the result of discussions held at AMIRA’s Exploration Managers’ Conference in the Barossa Valley back in March 2007. The conference is a biennial meeting of senior company executives, technology directors and research leaders from around the world, to discuss the issues of common interest relating to exploration research. The suggestion by AMIRA’s members was taken up initially through the development of a drilling technology roadmap, and then to the preparation of a formal CRC bid.

This is the second major success that has its roots in an earlier Exploration Managers’ Conference held in Margaret River, during which the concept of geometallurgical research was presented by a member company. The AMIRA P843 ‘GeM’ project was initiated in direct response to industry needs discussed at the conference. P843 has now grown to become one of the world’s largest integrated geometallurgy research program with some 30 researchers and 19 sponsors, according to AMIRA. The new extension project P843A has just started and, according to AMIRA, promises to deliver even more benefits to sponsors.

Planning for the 8th Biennial Exploration Managers’ Conference is now underway. It will be held between 22-25 March 2010 in the Yarra Valley, Victoria, Australia.