Geoscience BC expands mineral database searchable by location

Geoscience BC has completed a new project that would make data for hundreds more mineral exploration and development reports in British Columbia searchable by location for the first time.

National Instrument 43-101 technical reports contain comprehensive geoscience information on prospective mineral properties and are available from the Canadian Securities Administrators’ (CSA) SEDAR website. However, a challenge limiting their use is the lack of ability to search by location.

In January 2021, Geoscience BC published a report and data from a Purple Rock Inc. project that made it possible to search reports from 2004 to 2019 by location. Now, the new project has added reports from 2019 to 2021, including some previously missing data and merged data from both projects into one dataset.

In total, 1,262 NI 43-101 reports relating to mineral exploration and development in B.C. can now be searched by location. In addition, the two projects have added or updated 4,376 mineral occurrences in the province to the BC Geological Survey’s MINFILE database.

Christa Pellett, Geoscience BC's VP of minerals, said, "These projects make it easy to access data that would otherwise be extremely difficult and time consuming to access. It’s a great way for the mineral exploration and development sector, governments, Indigenous groups and communities to access key geoscience information from throughout British Columbia.”

The geolocated NI 43-101 reports can be accessed via Geoscience BC's Earth Science Viewer, the Geoscience BC website and on the BC Geological Survey’s MapPlace2.