PERTH (miningweekly.com) – Nickel developer Sirius Resources has secured consent from the traditional land owners on which its Nova project is located, to start mining the project.
The company entered into a binding and definitive agreement with the Ngadju group in April, and it was hoped that the agreement would be finalised by mid-2014.
The definitive agreement was a prerequisite for the granting of a mining lease over the Nova project.
Sirius MD Mark Bennett said on Tuesday that the agreement would allow the Ngadju group to share in the benefits of developing the Nova mine, through a variety of initiatives.
Earlier this year, Sirius took full ownership of its Nova-Bollinger project, in Western Australia, in exchange for A$28-million in cash and 70.6-million in shares.
A 2013 scoping study estimated that at a capital cost of A$471-million, the project could produce 28 000 t/y of nickel and 11 000 t/y of copper in concentrate, over an initial mine life of ten years.