Photo by: Bloombeg
PERTH (miningweekly.com) – Canadian company Cameco will not bring its Australian uranium projects into production until prices improve.
Speaking at a Committee for Economic Development of Australia briefing on Wednesday, Cameco Australia MD Brian Reilly noted that, while significant work had been done at both the Kintyre and Yeelirrie projects, Cameco was awaiting an upturn in uranium prices to bring the projects into production.
“For Australia, our strategy is to advance projects at a measured pace and to get the projects ready for when market demands new uranium production,” he noted.
Cameco completed a prefeasibility study at the Kintyre project in 2012 and it has inked an indigenous land use agreement. The company has also had its environmental review and management programme approved by the Western Australian Minister for Environment, as well as received state and federal environmental approvals.
“At Kintyre, we are facing a resource challenge and a tough uranium market, so we will continue to explore for more uranium at the mine, to take advantage of a time when the uranium price recovers,” Reilly said.
Environmental approvals for the Yeelirrie mine were started in the fourth quarter of 2014 and were currently going through a public review.
Once in production, Yeelirrie was expected to produce up to 7 500 t/y, or 16.5-million pounds a year, of uranium oxide over a 15-year mine life.