Uranium deposits in the Dewey-Burdock Project are sandstone, roll front type. This type of deposit is usually “C” shaped in cross-section, with the down gradient center of the “C” having the greatest thickness and highest tenor. The “tails” of the “C” are usually much thinner and essentially trail the “roll front” being within the top and bottom of the sandstone unit that is slightly less permeable.

These “roll fronts” are typically a few tens of feet wide and often can be thousands of feet long. Uranium minerals are deposited at the interface of oxidizing solutions and reducing solutions. As the uranium minerals precipitate, they coat sand grains and partially fill the interstices between grains. As long as oxidizing groundwater movement is constant, minerals will be solubilized at the interior portion of the “C” shape and precipitated in the exterior portion of the “C” shape, increasing the tenor of the orebody by multiple migration and accretion. Thickness of the orebody is generally a factor of the thickness of the sandstone host unit. Mineralization may be 5 to 12 ft thick within the roll front while being 1 to 2 ft thick in the trailing tail portions. Deposit configuration determines the location of well field drillholes and is a major economic factor in ISR mining.

Ore mineralogy consists of uraninite, pitchblende and coffinite with associated vanadium in some deposits. Typical alteration in the roll-front sandstone deposit includes oxidation of ........

Azarga plans to recover uranium at the Project Area using the In-Situ Recovery (ISR) method. The ISR method has been successfully used for over five decades elsewhere in the United States as well as in other countries such as Kazakhstan and Australia. ISR mining was developed independently in the 1970s in the former USSR and the United States for extracting uranium from sandstone type uranium deposits that were not suitable for open cut or underground mining. Many sandstone deposits are amenable to uranium extraction by ISR mining, which is now a well-established mining method that accounted for approximately 50 percent of the world’s uranium production in 2019 (ref., WNA 2019). The bottle roll tests demonstrate the potential feasibility of both mobilizing and recovering uranium with an oxygenated carbonate lixiviant.

Mining dilution (rock that is removed along with the ore during the mining process) is not a factor with the ISR method as only minerals that can be mobilized with the lixiviant are recovered. There are some metals, such as vanadium, that can be mobilized with the lixiviant and can potentially dilute the final product if not separated before packaging. If vanadium occurs in high enough concentration, it can be economically separated and sold as a separate product.

Many impactstypically associated with conventional uranium mining and milling processes can be avoided by employing uranium ISR mining techniques. The ISR benefits are substant ........

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