Papua New Guinea · Application
Tanga
EL 2923 · New Ireland Province · 767.9 km² · 224 sub-blocks
Location
EL 2923 covers ~767.9 km² over Boang, Malendok, Lif, Bitbok and Tefa Islands, about 60 km east of New Ireland and midway between Simberi and Lihir on the Tabar–Lihir–Tanga–Feni arc. Boang carries a mission and an airstrip with domestic flights.
Why we think it’s prospective
Tanga sits on the same potassic alkaline suite that built Lihir (>80 Moz) and Simberi (~8 Moz). The 1986 drilling tested only the smectite-dominant, near-neutral, sub-150°C cap — the steam-heated zone that is barren by definition — and at all three drilled prospects that cap is sealed beneath younger cover. The system is demonstrably still hot: four holes intersected hot water and the project geologist concluded the hydrothermal activity “must be considered as active” — a conclusion absent from the later reports.
The decisive point is spatial: 26 holes tested about 0.3 km² of a 767.9 km² licence, in one season, on one island. Boang — the largest island, carrying 13 of 21 priority-one targets — has never had a hole, a survey or a sample, and was never inside the old tenement.
Historical data, in summary
Newmont and Pacific Arc drilled 26 reverse-circulation holes (~1,990 m) in one 1986 season — all on Malendok, all vertical — supported by petrology, XRD and geophysics. The tenement lapsed in 1989 and nobody has returned. A modern spectral interpretation, calibrated on the Lihir and Simberi mine sites, identifies 34 targets (21 priority-one).