Australia’s Boss Energy has produced its first drum of uranium at its Honeymoon uranium project, in South Australia. This is a milestone as part of the commissioning process at Honeymoon, which will see production ramp up to 2.45-million pounds a year of uranium oxide (U3O8).
With the first drum of uranium successfully processed, Boss will accelerate plans to increase the production rate and mine life at Honeymoon. The current mine plan uses 36-million pounds of the project’s total 71.6-million-pound resource.
Half of the resource is already covered by the existing mining licence.
Boss also has a valid uranium mineral export permission for 3.3-million pounds a year.
Boss is also set to continue driving growth and superior returns with first production expected within weeks at its 30%-owned Alta Mesa project, in South Texas. When Alta Mesa reaches steady-state operations, Boss’ share of production will be 500 000 lb/y.
“Processing the first drum of uranium is a major milestone. As well as marking the start of production and cashflow, it shows conclusively that our mining and processing strategy is highly effective.
“This is pivotal because it paves the way for strong organic production growth by unlocking the value of our large resource and leveraging the infrastructure we have in place. We have also made extensive provision in the Honeymoon plant for increased throughput,” commented MD Duncan Craib.