Details of the year-end 2022 Mineral Reserve and Resource estimates including gold, silver, copper and gold equivalent grades and contained metal can be found in Reserves and Resources.
For 2023, Torex has budgeted $39 million in drilling and exploration, of which $20 million is budgeted to drilling within the Media Luna Cluster, $6 million for infill and step-out drilling within the ELG Underground, $6 million towards near-mine exploration, $2 million for regional exploration, and $5 million towards definition and grade control drilling.
Media Luna accounts for a substantial portion of our 2023 drilling budget of $39 million. Approximately 55,000 metres of drilling is planned for the Media Luna Cluster where we are focused on expanding the overall mineralized footprint of the deposit and launching an inaugural drill program at Media Luna West.
We are also optimistic about the potential to further increase the size of EPO as the deposit remains open to the north, south and west. 2022 drill results and the infill program planned for the first half of 2023 will form the basis of an internal prefeasibility study on EPO. We expect to complete the study in the first half of 2024 with a view to advancing to the mine design stage. EPO has the potential to play a key role in supporting our efforts to fill the mill and maintain consistent gold equivalent production beyond 2027.
At the ELG Underground, drilling will be focused on expanding known mineralized zones, upgrading mineral resources in order to bring them into reserves, and testing several high-potential targets below the open pits.