Former Uranium One CEO Neal Froneman is looking forward to the day when his uranium restraint of trade falls away in February 2009, the new Gold One CEO tells Mining Weekly.

Froneman says that he, personally, cannot become involved in uranium as a business, at this stage, but that Gold One’s Etendeka asset in Nambia has uranium-bearing material, as do some of the other gold assets of AfleaseGold, which is being converted into Gold One by way of a reverse takeover of the ASX-listed BMA Gold, of Australia.

‘I am under a restraint of trade, which falls away in February. I look forward to that date.

“We have an iron oxide/copper/gold deposit in Namibia, which certainly has uranium-bearing material in it.

“It’s very much an Olympic Dam-type deposit, but it’s also well known that many of the reefs that we are dealing with in AfleaseGold also have uranium-bearing material in them.

“Uranium is not something on which we are focused, but that does not mean that we are not bullish on uranium.

“In fact, I think that uranium still has a good long-term future, and I also think that other elements, such as thorium, will become more and more important in the nuclear fuel cycle.

“And again, I am pleased to say that Etendeka has high amounts of thorium as well.”

Thorium, a chemical element with the symbol Th and atomic number 90, is also a nuclear fuel.

There are significant quantities in India and the Indians have done a lot of work on the thorium nuclear fuel cycle, Froneman reports.

“At this point in time, the rest of the world is not set up to use thorium, but thorium could well, in the next 15 to 20 years, become a replacement for uranium and we would like to be on the front foot if that is the case.”

Dominion Uranium

As Uranium One CEO, Froneman was instrumental in developing the Dominion uranium operation in Klerksdorp before quitting suddenly earlier this year and concentrating solely on Uranium One’s associate company, AfleaseGold.

Uranium One has taken a decision to close Dominion and concentrate on its uranium assets outside South Africa.

“What has happened at Dominion is disappointing,” says Froneman, who says that it is inappropriate for him to comment, in that he is no longer CEO of Uranium One.

“But, perhaps, all I can say is that the Dominion orebody is exactly the same orebody we thought it was – the plant works, and I look past Dominion to the rest of Uranium One, and see a very bright future for Uranium One.”

Pressed further on what went wrong at the high-profile and much-publicised Dominion, Froneman put the uranium project’s demise down to cash becoming a scarce resource in the wake of the global credit crunch.

“The ramp-up took longer than expected, the consumption of a scarce resource like cash probably caused the Uranium One management to say it is going to be difficult to raise money and, therefore, it cannot continue funding the mine until it gets to commercial production.

“Costs have gone up, and all of this I quote from Uranium One’s own reports. I have no inside information – I am just guessing from what I read. “So, from that aspect, putting the mine on care and maintenance until the financial markets change may have been a very smart decision.

“Certainly, I am still a strong believer in Uranium One and also in Dominion,” he says.

Froneman still finds uranium as attractive as ever and believes that the uranium price will rise in the future.

From the point of view of Gold One, he makes the point that right now his focus is gold, and that Gold One will take decisions on what to do with the uranium and thorium material within its portfolio, at the appropriate time.

In the interim, however, he is prepared to say that thorium will ultimately sur- pass uranium following the develop- ment of a fuel cycle for thorium by the Indians.

“I dare say, you will hear a lot more about thorium from an energy point of view in the not-too-distant future.”

In Etendeka, Gold One has an exclusive prospecting licence over an area of 65 000 ha in the Outjo district of north-western Namibia.

To see a video on Neal Froneman's comments on uranium and thorium, click here.

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