Western Mines Group (ASX:WMG) is planning a plethora of activities at the Mulga Tank Project in Western Australia, with the aim of leading into an initial Scoping Study.
Speaking to Mining.com.au, Managing Director Caedmon Marriott says this work will involve the usual combination of reverse circulation and diamond drilling, with RC infill and step-out to expand the current resource.
“Also further diamond drilling to test deeper high-grade Perseverance-style targets,” Marriott tells this news service.
“Investors can expect a lot of news flow from the company over the next six months as we are back out continuously drilling and exploring at Mulga Tank.”
This news comes amid Western Mines beginning deep diamond hole EIS9, being drilled as a diamond tail to previous phase one RC hole MTRC009.
Hole EIS9 aims to target a magnetic high feature, from 3D magnetic inversion, coincident with a conductive mobile magnetotelluric anomaly within the basal zone of the Mulga Tank Complex. This feature sits in a possible fold hinge position at the base of the western margin.
More drilling for nickel
Marriott adds that concurrently, a high-powered moving loop electromagnetic (MLEM) survey has begun looking to extend the 2021-2022 survey over the mineralised komatiite system.
“The survey should take around 10-14 days and results will be used to aid targeting of seven co-funded exploration incentive scheme (EIS) holes to be drilled in 2026,” he explains to Mining.com.au.
Western Mines is also aiming to drill up to nine additional hotels within the main body of the complex before the end of the year, subject to second rig availability.
Marriott tells this news service that 2025 has been a milestone year for Western Mines, as in April it had released an initial resource estimate for Mulga Tank and unveiled “the largest nickel deposit ever discovered in Australia”.
Mulga Tank’s total resource contains 1.968 billion tonnes @ 0.27% nickel for 5.3 million tonnes of contained nickel, of which 565 million tonnes @ 0.28% for 1.6 million tonnes of contained nickel.
“We now see a lot of green shoots in the market and returning interest in the company as we might be through the worst of negative sentiment towards nickel,” Marriott says.
In April 2025, nickel futures hit the lowest price in four years to around US$14,150 per tonne, as reported by Trading Economics. At the time of writing, nickel futures sat at US$14,920 per tonne.
Nickel output has remained ample amid the over-expansion of Indonesia’s nickel sector since the country blocked the export of ores in 2020.
Trading Economics says this drove the largest nickel consumers to establish refiners within Indonesia and capacity soared, leading to supply surpluses.
The Indonesian Government reduced nickel mining quotas by 120 million tonnes to 150 million tonnes this year, cutting global supply by 35% from current levels. Nickel stockpiles at London Metal Exchange warehouses rose by 90,000 tonnes this year to over 250,000.
Western Mines Group is a diversified mineral explorer focused on developing Mulga Tank which is a major ultramafic complex found on the under-explored Minigwal Greenstone Belt.
Write to Aaliyah Rogan at Mining.com.au
Images: Western Mines Group
