The share price of triple listed Berkeley Energia fell on Monday, as the company announced that Spain had formally rejected its application for a uranium concentrate plant at its Salamanca project.
The announcement of the Ministry for Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge (MITECO) rejection did not come as a surprise and followed an unfavourable report from the country’s nuclear regulator in July this year.
Berkeley’s stock traded 16% lower in Madrid, 14% lower in London and 8% down in Sydney.
The uranium project previously stated that it refuted the Nuclear Safety Council’s (NSC’s) assessment and said that it believed the regulator had adopted an “arbitrary decision with the technical issues used as justification to issue the unfavourable report lacking in both technical and legal support”.
Berkeley has submitted documentation, including an ‘improvement report' to supplement the company's initial NSC II application, along with the corresponding arguments that it said addressed the issues raised by the NSC.
The developer claimed that documentation submitted to MITECO in early August, dismantled the technical issues used by the NSC as justification to issue the unfavourable report.
Berkeley has requested that its NSC II application be reassessed.
The CSN regulator previously said it took the decision owing to a lack of reliability and a high level of uncertainty over how radioactive waste would be stored at the facility.
Berkeley's Retortillo project in the western region of Salamanca received preliminary approval in early 2013 but has since faced local opposition.