PERTH (miningweekly.com) – The Northern Territory government has granted ASX-listed Arafura Resources mineral leases for areas supporting its Nolans neodymium-praseodymium (NdPr) project.
Arafura said on Tuesday that the mineral leases, which will host the Nolans borefield, were granted for an initial 25-year term and provide exclusive access for the construction, use and maintenance of the borefield to support the operations of the mine and the processing plant.
The mineral leases also enable the construction of a water diversion channel around the mining areas as required under the project’s environmental approvals condition.
The A$1-billion Nolans project is expected to deliver 293 000 t/y of concentrate, containing 4 357 t/y NdPr oxide, 135 808 t/y of phosphoric acid and 13 343 t/y total rare-earth oxide equivalent over a mine life of 33 years.
Arafura said on Tuesday that subject to funding, the company anticipated starting the next phase of borefield development, which will include stratigraphic diamond drilling, to finalise understanding of the exact ground conditions and enable final production bore design.
This drilling will be completed in parallel with the front-end engineering design for the project.