Uranium One Boosts Resources at Dominion
SXR Uranium One, the soon-to-be uranium producer, has boosted indicated uranium resources at its Dominion uranium mine near Klerksdorp following further drilling on the project.
The company has also included the resources of its dumps at Dominion, which it says will be treated during the first three years of plant operation than projected in a technical report released last year.
Two of the four dumps contain an indicated resource of 1.2 million pounds of uranium at a grade of 0.16kg/tonne and 55,000 ounces of gold at 0.51g/t.
”The introduction of tailings material is intended to maximise the use of the available plan capacity while underground tonage is being ramped up,” said the company in a statement.
Management expects to feed one million tonnes of slimes through the plant over the three-year period between 2007 and 2009.
The company says that later this year it will give guidance on the higher production expected, following this decision.
Indicated resources are up 37% on the previously released figure and have been estimated at 64.9 million pounds of U308 (uranium oxide) compared to 47.5 million pounds reported last year. Grades have remained the same at 0.83kg/t.
Resources in the inferred category have decreased with contained uranium at 183.6 million pounds compared to 199.2 million pounds previously, due to the conversion of these resources into the more confident indicated category.
Probable reserves remain at 18.5 million tonnes at an average grade of 0.77 kg/t containing 31.3 million pounds of U3O8.
The contained gold that would be extracted as a by-product has increased from 910,000 ounces and 3.6 million ounces in the indicated and inferred categories respectively to 1.1 million ounces (0.91g/t) and 4.8 million ounces (0.67g/t).
According to an extract from the technical report, Domionion would have produced 491,000 pounds of uranium in 2007, ramping up to 4.3 million pounds in 2012. The total cost per pound produced was expected to decrease from $23.5/lb produced in 2008 to $11/lb by 2013.
Average cash operating costs over the life of Phase I of US$14.50 per pound of U3O8, net of gold by-product credits. Start-up capital costs of US$152 million attributed to Q1 of 2007.
The company says it has also received prospecting rights for an area to the west of the existing Dominion Project area, where it says it has identified a potential Dominion Reefs strike extension.
Earlier this month, the company signed further sales contracts from Dominion to a number of western world utility customers. The total contract position of 4.7 million pounds of U3O8 from Dominion now represents approximately 28% of estimated production between 2008 and 2012.
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