Uranium One also announced earlier that it had agreed to buy additional assets to speed up its production plans in the US, and that it was in negotiations to sell its shuttered Dominion mine, in South Africa, for about $38,5-million in cash, net of transaction costs.

Speaking on a conference call, Nortier 
refused to speculate on the short-term outlook for the price of the nuclear fuel, but said that he remained “as bullish as ever” on the 
medium- to long-term prospects.

Uranium One produces uranium from mines 
in Kazakhstan, and owns 51% of the Honey-moon project, in Australia, as well as some processing facilities and deposits in the US.

“If you look at our results – and we have probably the cheapest producing uranium mines in the world from a public company perspective – and you say our cash costs are $16/lb to $17/lb, plus we sit with noncash costs of $14/lb to $16/lb. So, it’s $30/lb to $32/lb 
before you start making an operating profit,” Nortier said.

“And if the cheapest uranium mines in the world are producing at those numbers, then your marginal cost of production is a number significantly higher.”

Pricing service TradeTech reported that uranium oxide for immediate delivery rose 1,1%, to $47,50/lb, last week, the first gain in eight weeks.

The increase was linked to new demand from a non-US utility.

Nortier said that lower-grade deposits, such as in Namibia, or some conventional mining projects in the US, would need much higher 
prices, to be economically mined.

“We continue to think that the uranium price needs to lift considerably before you will  start to see  enough production come on line to fill the market.

“My view is that we need to see $80/lb to $100/lb before we are going to see marginal mines being brought into production,” he said.

Uranium One has agreed to buy the Irigaray in situ recovery (ISR) central processing plant, the Christensen Ranch satellite ISR facility 
and associated uranium resources in the Powder River Basin from a joint venture 
between Areva and EDF, for $35-million.

Both processing facilities are permitted and licensed, which will mean that the company will significantly reduce the permitting and construction risk that would be associated with developing its own central processing facility at its Moore Ranch asset.

The Moore Ranch operation will now likely 
become a satellite operation, with the loaded 
resins being transported to Irigaray for further 
processing into dried yellowcake.

Based on due diligence for the transaction, Uranium One expects to recover about eight-million pounds from the deposits acquired at the Irigaray and Christensen Ranch, Nortier said.

The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission licence at Irigaray allows for a maximum of 2,5-million pounds of dried yellowcake production a year.

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