Mineral and Petroleum Exploration, Australia

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Quarterly statistics on mineral and petroleum exploration expenditure by private organisations in Australia

Reference period
June 2023
Released
4/09/2023

Key statistics

  • Mineral exploration expenditure rose by 0.8%
  • Petroleum exploration expenditure fell by 3.7%
  Jun Qtr 23Mar Qtr 23 to Jun Qtr 23Jun Qtr 22 to Jun Qtr 23
  $m% change% change
Seasonally adjusted   
 Mineral Exploration Expenditure10390.81.1
 Petroleum Exploration Expenditure234-3.7-5.6
     
Trend   
 Mineral Exploration Expenditure1,0350.52.0
 Petroleum Exploration Expenditure2373.4-7.1

Mineral exploration

Total expenditure, seasonally adjusted and trend

  • Seasonally adjusted rise of 0.8% ($8.4m) to $1,038.9m

  • Trend rise of 0.5% ($5.6m) to $1,034.5m

Mineral exploration, by deposit type, original series

  • Rise of 19.4% ($174.0m) to $1069.9m 
  • Existing deposits rose 21.3% ($131.8m) to $751.6m
  • New deposits rose 15.3% ($42.2m) to $318.3m

Mineral exploration, by mineral type, original series

  • Selected Base Metals recorded the largest rise (up 20.1%, $47.4m) to $282.8m

(a) Selected Base Metals contains Copper, Silver, Lead & Zinc, and Nickel & Cobalt

(b) All Others contains Mineral Sands, Uranium, Diamonds and Other Minerals

Metres drilled, seasonally adjusted and trend

  • Seasonally adjusted fall of 3.9% (109.9km) to 2,698.8km
  • Trend fall of 1.7% (46.5km) to 2,736.5km

Metres drilled, original series

  • Rise of 16.8% (407.8km) to 2,840.5km
  • Existing deposits rose 12.3% (224.4km) to 2,047.3km
  • New deposits rose 30.1% (183.5km) to 793.3km

Petroleum exploration

Total expenditure, seasonally adjusted and trend

  • Seasonally adjusted fall of 3.7% ($8.9m) to $234.3m
  • Trend rise of 3.4% ($7.8m) to $237.4m

Onshore, seasonally adjusted and trend

  • Seasonally adjusted fall of 1.9% ($2.9m) to $152.0m
  • Trend rise of 1.7% ($2.5m) to $152.0m

Offshore, seasonally adjusted and trend

  • Seasonally adjusted fall of 6.9% ($6.1m) to $82.2m
  • Trend rise of 6.2% ($5.0m) to $85.1m

  

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Mineral Exploration - Quarterly mineral exploration expenditure and metres drilled

Petroleum Exploration - Quarterly petroleum expenditure

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Previous catalogue number

This release previously used catalogue number 8412.0.

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