PERTH (miningweekly.com) – A scoping study into a standalone uranium and vanadium operation at the Lake Maitland project, in Western Australia, confirmed the project economics.
ASX-listed Toro Energy previously flagged a capital cost of A$270-million to develop the operation, which would process at a rate of 1.94-million tonnes a year, delivering an average 1.3-million pounds of uranium oxide (U3O8) and 0.7-million pounds of vanadium pentoxide (V2O5) over a mine life of 17.5 years.
The scoping study, released on Monday, estimated that the project would have a pre-tax net present value of A$610-million and an internal rate of return of 41%, with a pay-back period of 2.5 years.
Total earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation for the project have been estimated at A$1.76-billion, averaging A$98-million a year, based on a U3O8 price of $70/lb and a V2O5 price of $5.67/lb.
C1 cash operating costs for the project have been estimated at $15.84/lb of U3O8 over the first seven years of the operation, and at $23.10/lb over the life of the mine, while all-in sustaining cost for the first seven years have been estimated at $20.32/lb U3O8 and at $28.02/lb over the life-of-mine.
“The board is delighted to report these outstanding scoping study results for the Lake Maitland deposit, which further highlight the quality and global significance of Toro’s uranium assets,” said executive chairperson Richard Homsany.
“These strong financial estimates and outcomes, driven by modest capital and operating costs, are the culmination of many years of extensive research and development by Toro to optimise the processing flowsheet.
“Lake Maitland represents a significant proportion of the Wiluna uranium project’s resource and these scoping study results clearly illustrate the transformational effect of the standalone Lake Maitland operation on the potential economics of the entire Wiluna uranium project.”
Homsany said that the company was confident that there was significant scope to further optimise the scoping study outcomes owing to Lake Maitland’s close proximity to the Centipede-Millipede and Lake Way uranium deposits within the Wiluna project.
“It is clear that the potential integration of additional resources from these deposits could increase the production at Lake Maitland and, in particular, extend the processing of high-grade uranium resource well beyond the seventh year of production.”