Great Northern Minerals Expands Catalyst Ridge Rare Earths Project with 96 New Lode Claims

Great Northern Minerals (ASX: GNM) has staked 96 additional lode claims to significantly expand the footprint of its recently acquired Catalyst Ridge rare earths project in California’s Mojave Desert.

The claims cover approximately 8 square kilometres nearby to the Mountain Pass mine and processing facility (owned by MP Materials Corp), the Mojave project (Locksley Resources, ASX: LKY) and the Colosseum gold magnetite-breccia deposit (Dateline Resources, ASX: DTR).

They are prospective for rare earth elements (REE) and antimony-gold mineralisation, and complement 119 existing lode claims at Catalyst Ridge, which sits within the world’s mostly sought-after rare earth corridor in a strategic US critical metals hub.

Strategic Exploration Presence

Great Northern Minerals non-executive chair Eddie King said the new claims strengthen the company’s strategic presence in one of the nation’s most important regions for critical minerals exploration.

“We are excited to have staked freely-available ground with very interesting geophysical features that have shown the potential to host deposits of globally-significant scale and importance,” he said.

“We will be working closely with our US-based geology team to begin fieldwork in the coming weeks.”

The company plans to integrate the new claims area into the project’s upcoming exploration strategy, which will endeavour to identify targets for drill testing.

Prospective Geological Setting

The new claim area sits within overlaying Permian to Devonian limestones concealing Proterozoic granites, with detailed magnetic data revealing numerous structures the company considers to be highly-prospective for REE-bearing carbonatite intrusions.

The claims contain extensive magnetic high features similar to those at Dateline’s Colosseum ground to the west, and feature at least four prominent gravity features where the edges may indicate areas prospective for REE, gold and antimony.

They also reportedly contain several radiometric uranium anomalies that could be significant as the Mountain Pass REE deposit is widely-known to be associated with uranium mineralisation.

Mr King said the company would need to conduct further field investigations to assess the potential of these areas.