As anyone familiar with Irish folklore knows, it’s a fool’s errand to look for Leprechaun gold at the end of the rainbow. Luckily, in Ulster there is a pot of gold which is far more attainable.

Curraghinalt, in Northern Ireland’s Sperrin mountains, is currently sitting on top of the largest gold deposit ever discovered in the United Kingdom – some 3.5 million ounces. With gold prices at an all-time high, it is worth an estimated £11.5 billion.

Alongside the gold in them hills, there are 1.7 million ounces of silver and 15,000 tonnes of copper. Both metals are in huge demand because of green technologies. Silver is used in solar and high-current electronics while copper is found in every modern battery.  A single Tesla, for example, requires a kilo of silver and 50 kilos of copper. Other minerals found in Sperrin include tellurium, antimony and bismuth. All are classified by the government as critical minerals, which most of the world is desperate to get hold of.

Unfortunately, this literal treasure trove is untapped. Why? Not because of a lack of will. Dalradian, an American-backed mining company, started exploring Sperrin in 2009, spending $400 million and drilling 190,000 metres to confirm the site was viable. In 2017, it submitted a planning application to extract the gold,........

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