Primary uranium mineralisation in the Etango-8 Project area is related to uraniferous leucogranites, locally referred to as alaskites. The alaskites are often sheet-like, and occur both as cross-cutting dykes and as bedding and/or foliation-parallel sills, which can amalgamate to form larger, composite granite plutons or granite stockworks, made up of closely-spaced dykes and sills. These alaskite intrusions can be in the form of thin cm-wide stringers or thick bodies up to 200 m in width.

The alaskite bodies have intruded into the metasediments of the Nosib and Swakop Groups of the Damara Supergroup. These metasediments and alaskite intrusions flank the Palmenhorst Dome which is cored by Mesoproterozoic (1.7 2.0 Ga) gneisses, intrusive rocks and meta-sediments of the Abbabis Metamorphic Complex.

Uranium mineralisation in the Etango-8 Project area occurs almost exclusively in the alaskite intrusives. Minor uranium mineralisation is also found in the metasedimentary sequences close to the alaskite contacts, probably from metasomatic alteration and in minor thin alaskite stringers within the metasediments.

The dominant primary uranium mineral is uraninite (UO2), with minor primary uranothorite ((Th,U)SiO4) and some uranium in solid solution in thorite (ThO2). The uraninite is commonly associated with chloritised biotite in the alaskites and with ilmenite and magnetite within foliated alaskites. The primary uranium mineralisation occurs as micros ........

The deposit is a large, shallow uranium deposit that is amenable to bulk open pit mining, followed by crushing, heap leaching, ion-exchange, nano-filtration and uranium recovery. The heap leaching operation can treat approximately 8Mtpa dry ROM feed material to produce on average 3.5 million pounds of triuranium octoxide (U3O8) per annum to be drummed and shipped.

For the purpose of the Etango-8 PFS, it was assumed that mining would take place by conventional open pit methods and that the whole mining operation, except for the mine technical services function, will be outsourced to a reputable mining contractor company. This includes drilling, blasting, loading and hauling of ore and waste.

Drilling and blasting would be performed on 12 m high benches. Waste benches will be excavated in a bulk mining fashion with shovels on a single 12 m bench while mineralised benches will be selectively loaded in three 4m flitches using backhoe excavators to minimise ore loss and dilution. The truck and shovel match on the ore and waste benches have been considered by the reputable mining contractor as follows:
- A 130-t hydraulic backhoe shovel would be employed for selective loading purposes;
- The waste benches would be mined in a bulk mining approach where a 250-t hydraulic face shovels will be utilised to load the full 12 m bench;
- In both cases 100-t capacity, off-highway rigid haul truck would be used and standard open-cut drilling and auxiliar ........

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