Australia-listed Peninsula Energy on Monday announced a A$60-million equity raise to fund the restart of production at the Lance mine, in Wyoming – one of the biggest near-term uranium development projects in the US.
The placement would enable the company to progress preproduction construction works at Lance to achieve a production restart by late next year, the company said in a statement.
Peninsula will raise A$50-million through the issue of about 666.7-million placement shares at A$0.075 a share, and an additional A$10-million through a security purchase plan at the same price.
“Following the successful completion of the equity raising, Peninsula will be well capitalised to continue works at the Lance project and deliver on the timeline to production restart,” commented MD and CEO Wayne Heili.
He stressed that Lance would come online at an “opportune time”, well positioned to deliver into a growing, supply-constrained market.
Peninsula in August unveiled a new life-of-mine (LoM) plan for the Ross and Kendrick production areas at the Lance uranium project, having earlier flagged a significant delay in the restart of production.
The LoM features a 5 000 gallons per minute uranium in-situ recovery plant to produce two-million pounds a year of dry yellowcake product over an estimated production life of ten years, and a yellowcake LoM production of 14.8-million pounds.
Production in the first two years is planned to be solely from the Ross production area, with production from Kendrick planned to start in 2027.
The new LoM has estimated a capital cost of $285.8-million, with the remaining capital to first production estimated at $53.4-million. The updated financials estimate an LoM operating cash flow of $258.2-million before tax, and a net present value of $116.2-million with an internal rate of return of 26%.
The project’s all-in sustaining cost has been estimated at $42.46/lb.