Geological framework and dominant mineral resources of Oceania

Located across Indo-Australian plate, Pacific plate and Eurasian plate, Oceania has undergone long and complex tectonic evolution since Archean. Three major tectonic units can be identified according to the regional geology of this region, i.e., middle-western Australian Precambrian craton, eastern Paleozoic orogenic belt and Circum-Pacific Meso-Cenozoic island arcs. Theses three major tectonic units could be subdivided into twelfth second-order tectonic units and forty third-order tectonic units. The three major tectonic units exhibit different types of rock assemblage and mineralization due to the unique tectonic evolution history of each unit. Mineralization characteristics of the three major tectonic elements are summarized on the basis of a comprehensive analysis of the relationship between the tectonic evolution and the mineralization events: the mineralization of the middle-western Australian Precambrian craton mainly took place in Archean and Proterozoic, with the dominant mineral resources being gold, copper, nickel, manganese, iron, uranium, REE, lead-zinc bauxite, which were associated with the development of Australian Precambrian craton; the mineralization of the eastern Paleozoic orogenic belt mainly occurred in Paleozoic, and dominant mineral resources were copper, gold, lead-zinc, tungsten and tin, which were associated with the interaction between Palaeo-Pacific and Australia; the mineralization of the Circum-Pacific Meso-Cenozoic island arcs mainly occurred in Miocene-Pleistocene, and the dominant mineral resources produced included copper, gold, nickel and cobalt, which were related to the interaction between Indo-Australian plate, Pacific plate and Eurasian plate. An overall assessment shows that Oceania has very good iron, manganese, copper, gold, bauxite, uranium, nickel and REE resource potentials.