SMM8, March 3 / PRNewswire-FirstCall-Asianet / GME Resources, an Australian miner, has released a feasibility study to further elaborate on its NiWest nickel-cobalt project. According to the study, the NiWest nickel and cobalt project is "technically and financially robust and can directly produce high-purity nickel and cobalt sulfate products over the long term to help companies accelerate their involvement in and development of the lithium-ion battery raw material market."
NiWest, located in the Esperance region of Western Australia, produced 46000 tons of nickel and 3200 tons of cobalt in 2016 from the Murrin nickel, cobalt mine and cobalt mine adjacent to mining giant Glencore. NiWest's initial ore reserves were estimated at 64.9 million tons, with ore grades of 0.91 per cent of nickel and 0.06 per cent of cobalt and estimated reserves of 592000 tons of nickel and 38000 tons of cobalt, respectively.
NiWest has an initial service life of 27 years and is expected to produce 19200 tons of nickel and 1400 tons of cobalt annually over the first 15 years, the study said.
After the investment decision is made, the construction of the project will take 24 months, while debugging and other work will take another 20 months. The company has promised to do more to determine the next step, with pre-production capital expenditure expected to be A $966 million. "GME intends to engage more extensively and in-depth with potential strategic partners and acquirers before embarking on a final feasibility study of the NiWest project," the company said. The objective of this process is to further clarify the modalities for the allocation of ownership of GME and NiWest projects, development, and the composition of the funding structure.
Jamie Sullivan (Jamie Sullivan), managing director of GME, said, "it is estimated that the economic life cost of the mine is US $8 per pound of nickel and US $25 per pound of cobalt, with a net present value after tax of A $791 million and an internal rate of return of 16.2 per cent. The pre-tax payback period is 4.4 years ".
Sullivan also said that "the rapid development of the lithium-ion battery market for electric vehicles and the growing demand for products such as nickel and cobalt sulfate have made GME attach great importance to this mining project."
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