PERTH (miningweekly.com) – A prefeasibility study (PFS) for a high purity alumina (HPA) project in the Kwinana industrial area, in Western Australia, has demonstrated that ASX-listed King River Resources could be a significant producer of high value purity alumina.
The HPA product would use King River’s ARC process to produce the HPA from an industrial chemical feedstock.
The PFS estimated that the project would require a capital investment of A$203.4-million to support a production rate of 9 000 t/y of HPA of 4N purity. Over the 25-year project life, the HPA project would have an annual earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization of A$193-million, an annual pre-tax free cash flow of A$190-million and projected revenues of A$7.02-billion over its project life.
The HPA project’s net present value before tax has been estimated at A$1.04-billion, with a pre-tax internal rate of return of 50.8%.
“The completion of the Kwinana HPA PFS is an important milestone for King River, and confirms the project is getting well positioned to become a global HPA participant,” said King River chairperson Anthony Barton.
“This PFS has effectively endorsed the company’s strategy to initially focus on entering the global HPA market, then consider developments at a later date of higher high value/high purity commodities sourced from the Speewah vanadium/titanium and fluorspar deposits.
“These very positive study outcomes support the Kwinana project’s transition immediately towards a more detailed definitive feasibility study.”