Allied Critical Metals has launched a fully funded 20,000 metre drilling programme at its wholly owned Borralha Tungsten Project in northern Portugal, marking the company’s most ambitious exploration campaign at the site to date.
The 2026 programme is designed to build on strong drill results delivered in 2025 and to further define the scale and grade of tungsten mineralisation ahead of economic studies and potential resource expansion. Drilling will combine core and reverse circulation methods across several priority target zones within the Borralha licence area.
The campaign will focus on step-out and infill drilling aimed at expanding and upgrading the existing mineral resource estimate, which was significantly increased in late 2025. Additional work will test extensions of the Santa Helena Breccia and other prospective zones identified during recent exploration, while also targeting the Venise Breccia north of Santa Helena, a historically recognised high-grade structure associated with wolframite and molybdenum mineralisation.
Material collected during drilling will also be used for advanced metallurgical testing to support prefeasibility work and economic modelling. The programme is expected to generate key inputs for a Preliminary Economic Assessment that the company is targeting for completion in the first quarter of 2026.
According to Allied, recent exploration has confirmed both bulk-style mineralisation and higher-grade corridors that could be suitable for future underground mining. The project has already passed several regulatory milestones, allowing it to advance through detailed engineering and permitting stages alongside ongoing drilling.
The Borralha project is considered one of the more advanced undeveloped tungsten assets in Western Europe. Tungsten is classified as a critical raw material in both the European Union and the United States, highlighting the strategic importance of projects that can contribute to supply diversification away from dominant producers.
