Copper giant Rio Tinto has announced a maiden resource and new gold discovery for its Winu copper-gold project in Western Australia.

In a press release Tuesday, the company said that at a 0.2% copper equivalent cutoff, is 503Mt at 0.45% copper equivalent.

“Study work to date suggests the copper mineralisation supports the development of a relatively shallow open-pit mine, combined with industry-standard processing technology that is used at other Rio Tinto sites,” the company said. “We are targeting first production from Winu in 2023, subject to securing all necessary approvals.”

Looking at the new gold zone, the company said that there is the potential to create a large-scale regional operation.

“We’re taking a more agile and innovative approach at Winu, and are working on the studies for a small-scale, start-up operation focused on Winu’s higher-grade core as we take another step towards commercialising this deposit. We are also assessing options for future expansion in the Paterson region given the extent of mineralisation identified to date and our large land package,” said Stephen McIntosh, Rio Tinto group executive of Growth & Innovation and Health, Safety & Environment, in the press release. “We’ve so far carried out exploration activity in just 2% of our tenements in the region and we’re building on this discovery at Winu with further encouraging results.”

Analysts at BMO said that although the maiden resource at Winu is “modest” in size, there is strong potential for future growth.