Olympic Dam Geology

Kathy Ehrig, Jesse Clark, Nick Poznik

22 October 2018
Garry Davidson Symposium - UTas
Acknowledgements
BHP Olympic Dam University of Adelaide
• +120 geoscientists who have worked at Olympic Dam • Nigel Cook
• Cristiana Ciobanu
University of Tasmania • Edeltraud Macmillan- completed PhD 2016 (works for BHPB OD)
• Dima Kamenetsky • Alkis Kontonikas-Charos- completed PhD 2017
• Jocelyn McPhie • Sasha Krneta- completed PhD 2017
• Maya Kamenetsky • PhD Students: Liam Courtney-Davies, Max Robert Verdugo Ihl,
• Olga Apukhtina- completed PhD 2016 Marija Dmitrijeva, William Keyser, Danielle Schmandt, Mark
• Qiuyue Huang- completed PhD 2016 Rollog

• Alexander Cherry – completed PhD 2018 • Adelaide Microscopy

• PhD Students: Matthew Ferguson, Nathan Chapman

South Australian Mining and Petroleum Services Centre of
• CODES Laser Ablation Facilities Excellence (Department of State Development)
• Trace elements in iron oxides project
University of Melbourne- Roland Maas
• Copper Uranium Hub project (joint ARC project IH130200033)
CSIRO Land and Water, Adelaide- Mark Raven
Geological Survey South Australia- Alan Mauger
ARC Linkage LP130100438 - The supergiant Olympic Dam
uranium-copper-gold rare earth element ore deposit: towards a new
genetic model
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Olympic Dam Operations

History
• Deposit discovered by WMC in July 1975

• First underground access in 1982

Mechanised sublevel longhole open stope mining
• Production commenced in 1988

• BHP acquired WMC in July 2005

Grinding and concentrator
Hydrometallurgical treatment Current operation
• Mechanised sublevel open stope mining

• Grinding and sulphide concentrator

• Hydrometallurgical circuit- U extraction

Smelting and acid production Cu refining and PM production • Single stage flash smelter

• Acid plant production

• ER-EW Cu refineries Þ Cu cathode

Fully integrated circuit • Precious metals refinery (Au, Ag bullion)

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 Olympic Dam Resource Footprint
pre-1975 aerial photo TMI CONTOURS
2014 image BOUGUER GRAVITY CONTOURS
RD1 – RD10

Resource Outline
(2017)

5 7
9
10
RD10
RD1 4 6
10
1
3

Olympic Dam
Olympic Dam
Olympic Dam Breccia Complex (ODBC)
1 km

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Today’s Presentation

Olympic Dam Operation – Summary

Controls on High-Grade Mineralisation
***high-grade distinguishes IOCGs from hypogene parts of porphyry Cu***
• geology, structure, alteration, brecciation, mineralisation
Deposit Preservation
Conclusions ~1590 Ma
?
Groves (pers comm)
? ?
? ?
?

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Olympic Cu-Au Province– Summary
Why is the Olympic Province so well endowed?

Hayward and Skirrow (2010)

• “…extensively reworked lithosphere with older [prior to ~1590 Ma]
metasomatised SCLM…”
• “…high frequency of translithospheric shear zones…”
• “…oxidised A-type plutons…”
• “…juvenile magmatic input manifest in mafic-ultramafic
intrusions and basalts…”
• “…abundance of mafic volcanics in the lower Gawler Range
C
Volcanics”

Reid and Fabris (2015)

• “…preservation of [Fe-rich sediments] rocks at low metamorphic
grade containing formation waters and porosity provided a fertile
geochemical environment into which high-temperature, felsic and
mafic magmas, and their associated hydrothermal cells were
emplaced and developed…”

Clark et al., (2017, submitted)

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Olympic Domain – Geology and Falcon Gravity
Fe-oxides (IOA-IOCG)
TD • OD- Olympic Dam
OD • WW- Wirrda Well
SG • AC- Acropolis
BL • SG- Snake Gully
• BL- Bill’s Lookout
• ID- Island Dam
AC • TD- Todd Dam

WW

ID
10 km

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Olympic Domain – Paleo to Mesoproterozoic Basement
Not to scale
Host to IOA-IOCG alteration/mineralization
(1587-1596 Ma) All of these units are easy to visually and chemically identify
(1575-1595 Ma)

Wallaroo Group (~1740-1765 Ma)

laminated metasedimentary units,
mafic intrusions and volcanics

(~1700-1750 Ma)

Neoarchean – early Paleoproterozoic megacrystic felsic GRV mafic/UM dyke

Donington equigranular lavas, sills,
granite Hiltaba dykes
modified from Creaser (1989)
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Olympic Dam Cu-U-Au-Ag Deposit - Summary
A World-Class Orebody
Key Points
• no surface expression of the deposit
work in progress
• concealed by ~350m of unaltered ‘cover sequence’
• tectonic-magmatic-hydrothermal breccia-hosted Fe-oxide Cu-U-Au-
Ag deposit (IOCG-U type)
• Olympic Dam Breccia Complex footprint ~50 km2.
• hosted within the ~1593 Ma Roxby Downs Granite
• deposit footprint ~6 km x 3 km x 800 m
• unequivocal spatial correlation between Fe, Cu, U3O8, Au, and Ag
across the deposit due to the co-precipitation of these elements
Deposit-wide Mineralogical Zonation
• progressive increase in Fe from edge to centre
• Fe-oxide alteration (Fe+2 → Fe+3 ).
magnetite + apatite + chlorite → hematite + sericite
siderite → fluorite → barite
• py → cp → bn → cc
• polymetallic Zn-Pb-Ag and granite-related Mo-Sn-W
• uraninite - coffinite – brannerite
Modified after Ehrig et al. (2012) • three styles of gold mineralisation
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Long-section: SE-NW

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Roxby Downs Granite (RDG)
RDG Mineralogy
• ~50% alkali feldspar
• ~20-25% quartz
• ~20-25% sodic plagioclase
• <10% magnetite, biotite, amphibole
• trace abundances of titanite, apatite, zircon, rutile, allanite,
fluorite, ankerite, synchysite, uranothorite, galena, sphalerite,
pyrite, chalcopyrite

“Fresh” RDG criteria (Ehrig et al. 2012)

• whole rock chemistry: K2O/Na2O = 5.5/3.5 = ~1.6
• magnetic susceptibility ~25-50 x 10-3 SI units
• presence of magmatic biotite
• ~300 diamond drill holes in unbrecciated RDG, none of which
are entirely “fresh”

“…fresh but NOT pristine…” (Kontak 2017)

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Felsic Gawler Range Volcanics & Felsic Dykes (~1590 Ma)

fv

fv

: qtz-feldspar phyric felsic dyke

RD2899 406.6m

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Olivine-phyric dykes and lava/sills (~1590 Ma)

RD917 429-435m

RD2570 759-767m

RD2786A 2067-2079m

RD3008 398-400m Johnson and Cross (1995)

Huang et al. (2016, 2017)
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Olivine± pyrox± plag± phlog± qtz dykes (~1590 Ma)

RD3013 740.8m

Johnson and Cross (1995)

Huang et al. (2016, 2017)

apatite
~1590Ma

RD3013 726.2m
RD2727 1040-1047m RD1914 452.5m

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Sericite-altered, vfg mafic-ultramafic dykes
Sericite-altered ‘waxy’ (ultra-)mafic dykes
• anomalous Al (>9 wt%), Zr (>400 ppm), Ti (>0.3
wt%), Mg (13 wt%) and other HFSE e.g. REE,
Hf, U, Th,Ta, Nb + K.
• micron size sericite and crystals of zircon, rutile,
and REE minerals
• ‘waxy’ sericite texture accompanied with
elevated Ti and Mg suggests mafic-ultramafic
• intense hematite-sericite alteration is common
• high grade sulphide concentrations are often
associated with the margins of these dykes
• ‘feeder-style’ dykes to most mineralization in the
NW arm of the deposit
• lamprophyre(?) is a potential protolith
RU56-9778 250-265m

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Bedded Clastic Facies (BCF)
Contains ~1590 Ma zircons
KHEMQ Conglomerate: polymictic volcanic clasts (KFMU)
Interbedded Sandstones and Mudstones

RD2919B 682-690m

VASH RD3449 398-406m

Contains ~1590 Ma zircons

Brecciated, quartz-rich sandstone (KGRN)

RD2765 448-451m

KASH

RD2751 860-868m
Contains ~1590 Ma and OLDER zircons.
RD3449 458-466m Pandurra Formation (~1424 Ma)
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Gairdner Dyke Swarm (dolerites-basalts) ~820 Ma
RD2773 1333.2m

apatite
~820Ma

Residual Total Magnetic Intensity

showing the Gairdner Dyke Swarm
(modified from Direen and Lyons, 2007). Huang et al. (2015) RU65-8337 584.2m

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Olympic Dam Lithologies (below the ‘unconformity’)

• Roxby Downs Granite: ~1594 Ma ü

• felsic Gawler Range Volcanic dykes/lavas: ~1594 Ma üü?
• mafic/ultramafic dykes and picrite lava: ~1594 Ma üü • Progressively, yet extensively brecciated and
• ‘waxy’ sericite dykes: ~1592 Ma üü altered by the Fe-oxide tectonic-magmatic-
hydrothermal breccia system.
• bedded clastic facies: ~~1590 Ma üü
– interbedded sandstone and red mudstone (KHEMQ) • Where the primary texture is partially-to-completely
– interbedded green sandstone and mudstone (KASH) preserved (i.e. not entirely replaced by hematite),
– thinly bedded tuffaceous green and red mudstone (VASH) the macroscopic texture plus geochemical
– polymictic, felsic and mafic volcanic-clast conglomerate
signatures are diagnostic of each lithology
(KFMU)
ü?ü?
• well-sorted quartz-rich sandstone (KGRN): possibly ~1424(?) Ma

• Gairdner dolerite dykes: ~820 Ma

ü • Causes local-scale brecciation, retrograde magnetite alteration
and weak remobilisation of metals

ü = pre-mineralisation ü = syn-mineralisation ü = post-mineralisation

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Olympic Dam Structure – Summary (early 1990s)

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Olympic Dam Structure – Summary (early 1990s)

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Brecciation Processes – Summary (early 1990s)

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 “fresh” RDG biotite-out ODBC

HyLogger-3 Traverse
muscovite → phengite
Mauger et al. (2016)

Mg-chl → Fe-chlorite

presence of K-feldspar

presence of albite

Olympic Dam Geology plagioclase destruction

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Magmatic → post-magmatic → hydrothermal alteration
Kontonikas-Charos et al. (2017) Petrographic studies
Krneta et al. (2016) • provide observations which can’t be revealed by drill core
assaying or HyLogger alone
• heterogeneous alteration throughout drill core samples, as well as
in thin section.
• well preserved grains present in Na and Ca-Na altered RDG
• Ca-Na alteration: alb + ser + epidote + chl + titanite + qtz
• Na alteration: alb + ser + chl + rut + hem + qtz
• hydrolytic alteration: ser + chl + rut + hem + qtz
calcic-sodic → sodic → hydrolytic alteration
• within a minimum of ~4 km distance from the ODBC
Minerals record magmatic through to hydrothermal alteration
• alkali feldspar
• plagioclase
• mafic silicates (hornblende and biotite)
• accessory minerals (magnetite, titanite, apatite)
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Progressive alteration of the Roxby Downs Granite

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ODBC: Granite- to Hematite-Rich Breccias
***COMPLEX BRECCIA TEXTURES***
BUT
***SIMPLE MINERALOGY***

~3% Fe
~60% Fe
• Intense brecciation and texturally destructive hematite-alteration of RDG and other lithologies
• Chemical basis for sub-classification of granite- to hematite-rich breccias
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Quantitative Hematite-Sericite-Orthoclase (-350mRL)

hem (wt%) ser (wt%) ksp (wt%)

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Quantitative Barite-Fluorite-Siderite (-350mRL)

bar (wt%) flu (wt%) sid (wt%)

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Olympic Dam Mineralogy (>100 minerals)
15 minerals account for > 99.5% of the ores
pyrite, chalcopyrite, bornite, chalcocite
molybdenite, sphalerite, galena
tennantite-tetrahedrite, covellite
idaite, carrollite, cobaltite, arsenopyrite
electrum, native/alloys Au, Ag, Cu, Pd, As, Bi, Te
Au-Ag-Pb-Bi-Hg-Ni-tellurides
Pb-Cu-selenides
cuprite, tenorite, stibnite, enargite
scheelite-powellite, wolframite, cassiterite
***uraninite, coffinite, brannerite***
thorite, uranothorite, thorianite
bastnäsite, florencite, synchysite
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hematite, magnetite
Cr-spinels, manganosite
quartz, muscovite, orthoclase
chlorite, biotite, amphibole
barite, anhydrite, celestite, gypsum
plagioclase, albite, schorl, sphene
corundum, diaspore, kaolinite, topaz
siderite, ankerite, dolomite, calcite
ilmenite, rutile, ilmenorutile
fluorite, sellaite
zircon, xenotime, crandallite-group, fluorapatite
olivine, pyroxene, etc
28
Hypogene Sulfide Zonation: py → py-cp → cp-bn → bn-cc → cc

reflected light microscope images: FOV = 1800mm

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Sulphide veins in altered granites and granite-breccias

sulphide veins also occur in the breccias

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 Sulfide Mineral Distribution (-350mRL)
5% Fe SW NE
SW

-500

-500
A
6632000N

A
B -1000
58000E mpg
B
-1000
58000E mpg
SW NE
C

-500

-1000
C
6630000N

2011 Resource Outline

Meters below sea level
No vertical exaggeration
mpg = OD mine plan grid

Cu-Fe Sulfides

Non-sulfide 58000E mpg

py-cp
cp-bn
bn-cc

680000E 682000E
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Copper distribution maps - 1
-250mRL -300mRL -350mRL

Cu (wt%)

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Copper distribution maps - 2
-400mRL -450mRL -500mRL

Cu (wt%)

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Copper distribution maps - 3
-550mRL -600mRL -650mRL

Cu (wt%)

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Copper distribution maps - 4
-700mRL -750mRL -800mRL

Cu (wt%)

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Mo-Pb-Zn Distribution at ~450m below surface

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‘Deep’ Mineralisation: Mo-Sn-W signature

Modified after Ehrig et al. (2012)

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Uranium Mineralogy (uraninite-coffinite-brannerite)

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LA-ICPMS dating of uraninite
Uraninite ages, textures, REY patterns, trace element chemistry, and high precision 238U/235U and Sm-isotope studies:
• The main mineralising event at Olympic Dam was ~1590 Ma (no question)
• Remobilisation of ~1590 Ma uranium until the Delamerian, with possibility of minor U addition ~1200 Ma
• Significant addition of uranium into Olympic Dam during the Delamerian.

A common characteristic of super giant ore deposits, is upgrading via secondary enrichment, post
initial ore formation. Why should Olympic Dam be an exception?
Snowball Earth
Musgravian LIP event
(S)LIP event
orogeny (Gairdner dyke; Delamerian
(GRV & Hiltaba) Erosion &
Late Karanan (~1200-1160 Ma) ~825 Ma) orogeny
sedimentation (BIFs) Adelaidean (~515-485 Ma)
metamorphism orogeny erosion &
sedimentation
magmatism (~1450 Ma) sedimentation erosion (~750-650 Ma)

1.8 1.7 1.6 1.4 1.1 0.8 0.5

Columbia assembly Rodinia assembly Rodinia break-up Gondwana assembly

& break-up

Key events in the complex geological evolution of Olympic Dam

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Olympic Domain – Mesoproterozoic to Cambrian Cover
Not to scale

• Flat lying, underformed, unaltered, not mineralized

• Helps to constrain fault re-activation at Olympic Dam

can be variably mineralised

• Thicknesses of the Whyalla Sandstone, Tapley Hill and

Tapley Hill Formation (age = Sturtian) Pandurra Formations vary from absent to > 1 km.
• Not currently preserved in the cover sequence above
Olympic Dam.
Pandurra Formation (~1424 Ma) • Partially preserved at Wirrda Well, Acropolis, Oak Dam.

modified from Paterson (1986)

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Conclusions
Olympic Dam is a dismembered deposit
• Present orebody geometry does not necessarily reflect pre-
mineralisation structural architecture – rather remnants.
• Initially, at ~1595–1590 Ma: intense, texturally destructive
alteration and brecciation
– Physical fragmentation was early and initiated along
faults and fault intersections in granite host rock
– Multiple injections of volatile-rich mafic/UM dykes
resulted in explosive (phreatic) eruptions further
fragmenting the granite host rock
– Eventually, the breccia complex was overpowered by F-
rich (extremely acidic) hydrothermal fluid resulting in
pseudo dissolution-collapse breccias and intense
chemical fragmentation
• Multiple regional- and local-scale deformation events spanning
over 1 billion years (1.59-0.5 Ga)
• Major sinistral wrench structural event at ca. 1200-1050 Ma(?);
scale of vertical displacement unresolved.
• Major fluid remobilisation events corresponding to major
supercontinental cycles, particularly orogenic events
• Complex geometries can be resolved by structural events that
dislocate or rotate faulted blocks (modified after Jebrak et al., 2008)
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OD Deposit Setting: DATA Driven Change in Ideas
1990s 2010s
earlyearly
1980s1980s 1990s 2010s

Oreskes and Einaudi (1990)

Roxby Management Services (1980s)

modified Haynes et al. (1995) McPhie et al. (2011, 2016), Cherry et al. (2018)

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