Nevada Exploration and Austin Gold Complete Earn-In Agreement at Kelly Creek Gold Project, Battle Mountain Mining District, Nevada - Seite 3

Despite its proximity to significant mineralization, the interior of the Kelly Creek Basin has seen limited systematic exploration activity to date because its bedrock is largely covered by syn- to post-mineral volcanic units and post-mineral alluvium.  Recognizing the potential to find significant gold mineralization within the Kelly Creek Basin, dozens of major and junior explorers have spent tens of millions of dollars to follow the prospective geology seen in and proximal to the exposed bedrock in the surrounding mountain ranges beneath the sands and gravels covering the Basin.  Within the Project area, this activity has included: Santa Fe Pacific completing wide-spaced bedrock-mapping drilling in the 1990s; BHP completing an extensive soil auger geochemistry program through the late 1990s; and Placer Dome completing a reconnaissance-scale reverse circulation program in the early 2000s.  Other companies that either now hold or have held claims in the immediate area include Newmont, Barrick, AngloGold, Hemlo, Homestake, and Kennecott.  The efforts of each company have added valuable information about the geology of the Basin; however, without a cost-effective tool to conduct basin-scale exploration beneath the valley cover, the exploration programs to date in the Kelly Creek Basin have predominantly consisted of uncoordinated efforts focused on relatively small areas.

By integrating the use of its proprietary hydrogeochemistry technology with conventional exploration methods to evaluate the larger Kelly Creek Basin, NGE identified a highly prospective area in the middle of the basin along a portion of a structurally-controlled, shallow, covered, bedrock high coincident with highly anomalous gold and associated trace-element chemistry in groundwater.

In 2017, NGE completed a 61-hole, 5,864-metre shallow reverse-circulation drilling program at the Project using its Scorpion drill rig, to collect groundwater, alluvium, and top-of-bedrock geochemistry samples across a large area of the Project.  As NGE announced in January, 2018 (see news release: https://www.nevadaexploration.com/news/2018/nevada-exploration-enlarge ...), NGE believes the results of the Scorpion drilling program confirmed that the hydrothermal system that was active at the Project is gold-bearing over larger areas than previously known, with discrete zones of enriched gold in groundwater anchored to at least two clusters of >0.1 g/t gold in bedrock covering areas consistent in size with the geochemical footprints of the nearest major gold deposits, Lone Tree (produced 4.60 Moz gold from 1991 to 2015) and Marigold (production from 1989 n- 2016: 3.24 Moz gold plus 2016 Indicated Mineral Resource of 4.98 Moz, with 348.30 Mt at 0.45 g/t).  When combined with the results of earlier drilling, NGE’s updated geologic model suggests that the gold-bearing hydrothermal system at Kelly Creek is likely the northern extension of the system responsible for Lone Tree and Marigold, and is of a size to support major additional mineralization.  As the Kelly Creek Project continues to advance, per NI 43-101, 2.3(2), at this stage of development: the Project is an exploration target for which the potential quantity and grade of any mineral resource is still conceptual in nature, there has yet to be sufficient exploration to define a mineral resource, and it is uncertain if further exploration will result in delineating a mineral resource.  Mineralization hosted on adjacent and/or nearby projects is not necessarily indicative of mineralization hosted on the Company’s property.