Name of the Project
Dundas ilmenite project.

Location
Greenland.

Project Owner/s
Bluejay Mining.

Project Description
A prefeasibility study (PFS) on the project has highlighted a simple and proven development scenario, including dry mining, a wet concentrator and dry magnetic separation of mineral assemblage.

The PFS is based only on an initial Joint Ore Reserves Committee- (Jorc-) compliant ore reserve of 67.1-million tonnes, with a mean grade of 3.45% titanium dioxide (equal to 7.3% ilmenite in situ) and taken from within the Moriusaq project area only. The current Dundas mineral resource is estimated at 117-million tonnes with a mean grade of 2.91% titanium dioxide, following the addition of the Iterlak East and West mineral resources announced in May 2019.

The PFS considers a base case and an upside case.

The base case represents the project economics based on exploiting the current indicated mineral resources. The base case is defined geologically by active and raised beaches along the Moriusaq bay area, which host the mineral sands occurrences. The ilmenite-enriched heavy mineral sands tend to occur in the raised and active beach sediments.

Oversize material and tailings rejects will be transported to the mined-out areas for disposal, allowing for the continuous rehabilitation of the raised beaches.

The upside case represents the project economics based on exploiting the current indicated and inferred mineral resources.

As per the base case, the upside case is defined geologically by active and raised beaches along the Moriusaq bay area. In this case, the mine life has been extended by the addition of inferred resources to the mine schedule. The majority of these are located south of the Iterlak delta and are consequently not mined until the latter years of the mine life.

For the upside case, the heavy mineral sands are expected to be extracted using surface mining techniques, owing to the shallow nature of the orebody. The material will be transported to a wet plant for initial processing to produce heavy mineral concentrate. The heavy mineral concentrate will be transported to a dry plant to produce two ilmenite concentrates – premium and standard – which will be loaded onto ships for transport to customers.

Oversize material and tailings rejects will again be transported to the mined-out areas for disposal, allowing for the continuous rehabilitation of the raised beaches.

The project has an initial mine life of nine years.

Potential Job Creation
Not stated.

Net Present Value/Internal Rate of Return
The project has an after-tax net present value, at a 5% discount rate, of $83.1-million and an internal rate of return of 32.8%.

Capital Expenditure
Capital expenditure is estimated at $245-million.

Planned Start/End Date
For the base case, site construction works are proposed to start in June 2020, with the mining and processing of the ore expected to start in September 2021. First product shipment will occur in late October 2021.

Latest Developments
The Dundas project has received strong support from local citizens.

Greenland Industry Resources Minister Jens Frederick Nielsen has said that the Dundas project represents an “important opportunity for north-west Greenland and the country”.

In the same statement, Greenland Labour, Science and Environment Minister Jess Svane said that Dundas represented an environmentally low-impact mining project and that no environmental obstacles were foreseen.

Following several regional consultation meetings, Bluejay and the Greenland authorities will now start drafting answers to the questions received during the public consultation period. These questions and their answers will form the basis of the “white book”, which will be used to make amendments to the social- and environmental-impact assessments.

Analysts at SP Angel have said that it is rare to hear such strong support for a coastal mining project from government Ministers.

Bluejay is expected to start mining next year.

Key Contracts and Suppliers
HIS Robbines and Inuiplan A/S (value engineering process); Pangaea Logistic Solutions (shipping); and Orbicon|WSP (EIA).

Contact Details for Project Information
Bluejay Mining, tel +44 207 907 9326.