Overview

Mine Type	Open Pit
Stage	Permitting
Commodities	Uranium Zinc REE Fluorspar Neodymium Praseodymium Dysprosium Terbium
Mining Method	Truck & Shovel / Loader
Mine Life	...
Snapshot	Kvanefjeld is a large-scale rare earth project. In Dec 2022, Greenland Minerals (GMAS) submitted an amended exploitation licence application, in which GMAS requested (without prejudice to its original application of 2019) an exploitation licence for REEs, fluorspar and zinc only (Amended Application). On 1 June 2023, the Greenland Government rejected GMAS's exploitation licence application of 2019, based on Act No 20. The GMAS was also advised that its Amended Application would be rejected on the same grounds. GMAS has been engaged in an arbitration process in relation to the Kvanefjeld Project in Greenland since 2023. In the June 2024 it commenced further legal proceedings in the Danish and Greenlandic courts. As of Oct 2024, GMAS is awaiting a decision by the Greenland Court on the referral of that case to the High Court of Greenland in the near future. The Copenhagen District Court is expected to convene a case management call in the near future in the Danish case.

Deposit type

• Magmatic

Summary:

The lujavrite series within the Ilimaussaq Complex is at least 500 m thick and are generally fine-grained and laminated but there are locally some medium to coarse-grained pegmatoidal varieties. Black (arfvedsonite bearing) lujavrite is the rock type that hosts REE, uranium, and zinc multi-element mineralisation. Economic REE and uranium grades occur in the uppermost sections of the lujavrites, and are associated with distinct ore minerals. Mineralisation is predominantly orthomagmatic, with metal enrichment a function of differentiation of the lujavrite magma.

Steenstrupine is the most important host to both REEs and uranium in the lujavrite-hosted deposits. It is a complex sodic phospho silicate mineral. Mineralogical studies suggest that steenstrupine commonly contains between 0.2% and 1% U3 O8 , and greater than 15% total rare earth oxide. Steenstrupine is the dominant host to both uranium and REEs. The phosphorous in the mineral structure makes steenstrupine amenable to concentration by conventional flotation techniques.

The grain size of the steenstrupine commonly ranges from 75 µm to over 500 µm. Other minerals that are important hosts to REEs include the phosphate mineral vitusite and, to a lesser extent, britholite, lovozerite group minerals and rare monazite. Aside from steenstrupine, uranium is also hosted in zirconium silicate minerals of the lovozerite group. In these silicates a portion of the zirconium is substituted by several hundred ppm each of uranium, yttrium, REEs and tin. Zinc is hosted in the sulphide mineral sphalerite, which is the dominant sulphide, disseminated throughout the deposits.

Several substantial deposits of multi-element mineralisation (REEs, uranium, zinc) are hosted in the lujavrites of the northern Ilimaussaq Complex. A world-class multi-element resource has been established at Kvanefjeld, and substantial new satellite deposits have recently been confirmed at Sørensen and Zone 3. Geological evidence suggests that Sørensen and Zone 3 represent outcropping, or nearsurface expressions of a mineralised system that extends over several kilometres from Kvanefjeld, and is interconnected at depth. This is endorsed by exploratory drill holes that demonstrate that mineralisation is widespread outside the defined mineral resources.

The Kvanefjeld deposit occurs at the northern end of the Complex where lujavrite outcrops extensively. The Sørensen and Zone 3 deposits occur as sills within the naujaites at a high level within the Complex.

Mining Methods

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Comminution

Crushers and Mills

Processing

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Production

Operational metrics

Personnel

Job Title	Name	Profile	Ref. Date
.......................	.......................		Nov 14, 2024

Total Workforce	Year
......	2020