[Bhpbilliton] fyi - State funding to support Olympic Dam expansion

[Andy Whitmore]

** This article reminds me to ask if there is any planning to work on a 
shareholder resolution on uranium issues - probably necessary good idea 
to get planing now if so...?
*
State funding to support Olympic Dam expansion*

The South Australian Government has allocated funds for a task force 
looking into the massive and protracted study on expanding the big 
Olympic Dam copper-uranium-gold mine in the State's far north.

Ross Louthean - 
http://www.mineweb.com/mineweb/view/mineweb/en/page72103?oid=99796&sn=Detail&pid=92730

1 March 2010

ADELAIDE - An uranium conference in Adelaide was told today by the State 
Minister for Mineral Resources Development, Paul Holloway, that the 
planned transformation of the big Olympic Dam underground mine into a 
massive open cut operation would result in the world's largest uranium 
mine, third largest copper mine and a significant gold producer.

Holloway told Paydirt's Uranium Conference that the Rann State 
Government had allocated A$6.2 million (US$5.56 million) through to 
2012/13 for the Olympic Dam Task Force to assist owner BHP Billiton in 
proving the viability of this project.

Holloway said that the expansion would generate A$6.9 billion (US$6.19 
B) per annum in revenue when it reached full capacity and BHP's draft 
environmental impact study said the  would create up to 7,700 
construction and short term jobs during the 11 year period before full 
production is reached. The operation's workforce at Olympic Dam would 
also double to more than 8,000.

Holloway said that despite a slight drop in volume, the value of 
Australian uranium exports exceeded A$1 billion for the first time in 
2008-09.

"In terms of exploration expenditure on uranium in South Australia we 
have seen A$25.2 million (US$22.6 million) recorded in the most recent 
September 2009 quarter," he said.

Uranium exploration activity in South Australia continues to grow with 
over 300 uranium focused mineral exploration licences and over 100 
mineral exploration licence applications registered as at September 2009.

The growing importance of South Australia in the global uranium scene 
was reinforced by Access Economics back in November claiming that SA is 
set to become the world's next energy export powerhouse through its 
uranium reserves.

Recent developments included a ground breaking ceremony last April for 
the Honeymoon uranium project for which owner UraniumOne signed a A$104 
million (US$94.35 million) joint venture with the Mitsui group for 
development.

"If all goes to plan for Uranium One they expect to see production from 
Honeymoon in the second half of this year," Holloway said.

The Minister said the Government was looking forward to resolution of 
commercial issues facing the joint venture of Quasar Resources and 
Alliance Resources Ltd (ASX: AGS) on the advanced Four Mile uranium 
project, only 8 kilometres from the Beverley uranium mine operated by 
Quasar's parent Heathgate Resources which, in turn, is owned by global 
giant General Atomics.

First production from the A$90 million (US$80.8 million) Four Mile 
uranium project in South Australia is still possible in calendar 2010, 
according to 25% project owner, Alliance Resources.

In a separate presentation to the conference Alliance Resources' chief 
executive Steve Johnston said Four Mile's said the production milestone 
was achievable subject only to resolution of current legal issues 
between the company and 75% project owner Quasar.

The two parties are in dispute over native title issues relating to the 
joint venture -- with a court decision currently awaited -- payments to 
Heathgate Resources for modifications to the Beverley processing plant 
to process the Four Mile ore, and budget blowouts.

The project was initially estimated to cost A$90 million (Alliance: 
A$22.5 million share) but has been re-estimated higher to A$112 million 
(Alliance: A$28 million). Alliance has contributed just over A$13 
million to the mine's development to date.

"Alliance's position is that the cost blowouts are unnecessary and are 
an unjustified change of scope to the project," Johnson said.

"However, presuming a favourable court outcome and resolution of other 
matters, Four Mile can be producing this year as that mine decision was 
made in 2008 based on an in-situ recovery mining model," Johnson said.

"The joint venture has continued to move down that path since then as 
the project is low cost and low environmental impact," he said.

"We can be ready to go quickly with a resin loading plant at Four Mile, 
transport of resin by truck to Beverley for stripping, precipitation and 
drying, packing and storage of the concentrate, and then the return of 
the stripped resin by truck to Four Mile.

The project has an inferred and indicated resource of 9.7 million tonnes 
at 0.33% uranium oxide for contained concentrate of 31,700 tonnes.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.resist.ca/pipermail/bhpbilliton/attachments/20100301/056d9aa3/attachment.html>