Surefire Resources NL (ASX:SRN) has completed a pre-feasibility study (PFS) for the Victory Bore Vanadium Project on time and on-budget, supported by METS Engineers, Snowden-Optiro and other key specialists.
The PFS, which has been described as "outstanding", lays out a pre-tax net present value (NPV10%) of A$1.708 billion, with an internal rate of return (IRR) of 42.22% and a life of mine (LoM) of 24 years.
Those numbers add up to a pre-tax payback period of 2.4 years, based on a capital cost of A$767 million and operation expenditure of US$254 per tonne of concentrate.
The PFS is based on offshore processing, offering lower capital and operating costs, supported by a non-binding memorandum of understanding with the Ministry of Investment Saudi Arabia (MISA) for vanadium and critical mineral processing in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA).
Offshore processing the “right approach”
“This is an outstanding result for our world-class critical minerals project and shows that in the current economic environment, offshore processing is the right approach to getting this project into development and production,” Surefire Resources managing director Paul Burton said.
“We look forward to taking this project forward, completing the next significant milestones and engaging with Kingdom of Saudi Arabia KSA companies interested in being part of our project and development.”
SRN says its engagement with the KSA offers a low power and fuel cost jurisdiction with advantages in reducing operating costs while also offering market access to the KSA steel sector and Vanadium Redox Battery demand.
Operational details
The PFS is based on an ore reserve of 93 million tonnes at 0.35% vanadium, 5.2% titanium and 19.8% iron and will involve an optimal mining rate of 4 million tonnes per annum, producing about 1.25 million tonnes of high-grade magnetite concentrate to be processed into six end products.
SRN intends to produce a magnetite concentrate on Australian shores, which will then be shipped to the KSA for downstream processing.
Mining will use standard open cut methods with low strip ratios, drill and blast mining and load and haul transportation.
The six downstream products Surefire intends to create in the KSA include:
- High purity vanadium;
- Ferrovanadium;
- Titanium slag;
- Pig iron;
- High-purity iron oxide pigment; and
- High-grade iron ore.