Geologists have achieved a historic milestone in mine discovery by finding a ‘supergiant’ high-grade gold resource valued at an incredible 83 billion dollars. In economic geology, a ‘supergiant’ deposit represents a rare class of mineral systems that contain over 1,000 metric tons of gold. The Wangu gold field discovery is a global outlier, placing it among the top 1 per cent of the world’s most significant terrestrial wealth finds. There are very few deposits in the world that meet this definition and consequently they create an entirely different ranking of global reserves. The S&P Global Market Intelligence indicates that this deposit’s concentration of gold per tonne of rock is much higher than industry standards, which is why it is referred to as a ‘high grade’. Using advanced techniques such as seismic imaging and mineral modeling to analyze the USGS, researchers have defined a major orogenic system that has the potential to produce for decades to come, representing one of the largest discoveries of terrestrial wealth during the 21st century.
The 1,000-tonne record, shifted the global gold hierarchy
The Geological Bureau of Hunan Province made the find in Hunan Province’s Pingjiang County. This is a massive ‘supergiant,’ gold mine that has been located under the ground using state-of-the-art 3D modelling and deep-drilling technology, whereas the vast majority of gold mines are found at surface level. The exploration team explored the region and documented a total of 40 unique gold veins traveling through the rock up to a depth of 2 kilometers.If the preliminary data about 300 tonnes of gold in the first 2,000 meters of this mineralized field proves true, and considering that 3D modelling has predicted that 1,000 tonnes of gold will exist at depths of 3,000m, then this deposit would become the largest registered gold deposit on the planet, and would thus surpass South Africa’s deep mine (900 tonnes).
How earthquakes created the treasure
According to researchers, the concentration of gold at Wangu may have been the result of seismic activity in ancient times.Research published in the journal demonstrates that the gold was forged through piezoelectric discharge. During seismic events, stressed quartz acts as a natural battery, generating an electric voltage that triggers an electrochemical reaction. This process ‘flash-freezes’ dissolved gold out of hydrothermal fluids, depositing it into concentrated, high-grade veins
Technology behind the find world’s richest ‘supergiant’ gold mine
The findings were not simply chance or some sort of coincidence; rather, they were achieved by employing the ‘Super Powers of Geologists’ in a way that only Geologists know how to use their Super Powers. Using three-dimensional geological modeling combined with highly accurate deep-drilling tools allowed Geologists to construct three-dimensionally the underground ‘treasure threads’ missed from earlier more shallow drilling methods. Using AI to find mineral deposits consists of using AI algorithms to evaluate historic geochemical data in order to determine the precise locations of where mineral deposits intersect with deep crust faults.
