Overview
| Stage | Construction |
| Mine Type | Open Pit |
| Commodities |
- Total Rare Earth Oxides
- P2O5
|
| Mining Method |
|
| Processing |
|
| Mine Life | 35 years (as of Jan 1, 2017) |
Arafura Resources will, in the next few years, become a long-term, secure supplier of neodymium and praseodymium (NdPr) from its 100%-owned Nolans project. The project site is located 135 kilometres north along the Stuart Highway from the town of Alice Springs in the Northern Territory, Australia. |
Deposit Type
- Vein / narrow vein
- Pegmatite
Summary:
The Nolans Bore deposit is spatially close to several tin and tantalum pegmatites, and REE-bearing carbonatite/alkaline complexes (Mud Tank and Mordor Igneous Complex). This mineral field of carbonatites, pegmatites, and other REE occurrences is in a region transacted by three major lineaments delineated by O’Driscoll, which include the north–northwest trending G2-gravity lineament that is considered to be spatially related to the Olympic Dam deposit and northwest-trending G3-gravity.
The mineralisation at the Nolans Bore deposit is hosted in a series of east-northeast trending, and steeply dipping to the northwest, fluorapatite veins and breccia zones. The granite-gneiss host has been strongly kaolinised due to weathering.
Huston et al. (in press) describe four styles of mineralisation: massive fluorapatite veins that typically contain 4–6% REE oxides and constitute most of the defined resource; very high-grade (7º–10% REE oxide) zones found in cheralite-bearing, apatite-poor kaolinitic zones outside of the veins; apatite allanite epidote zones hosted by calc-silicates; and low-grade stockwork zones in gneiss and kaolinitised rock adjacent to the veins and mylonite zones.
Summary:
The Measured and Indicated resources base has the potential to support mining and processing operations for at least 30-35 years, at a design capacity of 14,000 tonnes of TREO equivalent per annum.
Open-cut mining will selectively target phosphate-rich material types which comprise more than two-thirds of the deposit’s Measured and Indicated resource inventory. Arafura is planning to mine up to five million tonnes each year to produce 650,000 tonnes of run-of-mine (ROM) ore as feed to a three-stage crushing circuit.
Summary:
Crushed ore will initially be processed in a beneficiation plant that employs whole-of-ore flotation as the main unit operation. Beneficiation reduces the mass for subsequent processing by around 50%.
The flotation concentrate will be pumped approximately 8 kilometres via a slurry pipeline to an extraction plant.
Chemical processing at the extraction plant will employ a phosphoric acid pre-leach process that leverages the phosphate-rich characteristics of the concentrate, resulting in the production of 110,000 tonnes of merchant grade (54%) phosphoric acid each year for sale into the fertilizer market.
Projected Production:
| Commodity | Product | Units | Avg. Annual |
|
Total Rare Earth Oxides
|
|
t
| 14,000 |
|
P2O5
|
Acid
|
t
| ......  |
Operational Metrics:
| Metrics | |
|
Mine annual capacity
| ...... |
* According to 2017 study.
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Reserves at December 31, 2017:
| Category | Tonnage | Commodity | Grade |
|
Measured
|
4.9 Mt
|
Total Rare Earth Oxides
|
3.2 %
|
|
Measured
|
4.9 Mt
|
P2O5
|
13 %
|
|
Indicated
|
30 Mt
|
Total Rare Earth Oxides
|
2.7 %
|
|
Indicated
|
30 Mt
|
P2O5
|
12 %
|
|
Inferred
|
21 Mt
|
Total Rare Earth Oxides
|
2.3 %
|
|
Inferred
|
21 Mt
|
P2O5
|
10 %
|
Mine Management:
| Job Title | Name | Profile | Ref. Date |
.......................
|
.......................
|
|
Feb 22, 2018
|
- 'Supplier or 'Investor' subscription is required.
Corporate Filings & Presentations:
| Document | Year |
|
...................................
|
2017
|
|
Other
|
2010
|
- Subscription is required.