uranium mining report, page-16

Curnamona wins key approval for SA project
CAMERON ENGLAND
From: The Advertiser
July 10, 2008 11:30PM
CURNAMONA Energy could be Australia's next uranium producer following the granting of a key approval today.
Chairman Bob Johnson said the State Government had granted the Adelaide company a retention lease over its Oban uranium prospect in the State's east.
Dr Johnson said this cleared the path for the company to lodge its mining and rehabilitation plan (MARP) for a trial mining project at the site, which would be done in the next four to five weeks.
Dr Johnson said the retention lease contained much of the information necessary under the MARP, which therefore, would not take long to prepare.
"It's very good news... we would suggest that there's a fairly good chance that we might be one of the next uranium producers in the country.''
If the MARP was approved, the timing of which is in the hands of the State Government, it would only take a few months to set up a trial in situ leach (ISL) mine, Dr Johnson said.
"It's very simple. We've basically done a fair bit of the design work already.
"It's a straightforward, low-scale exercise and then that will become a larger version to be a commercial one.
"We'll probably only run it for a month or so.''
The company has not published a resource figure for the Oban deposit "mainly because it would be largely meaningless without knowledge of the critical ISL recovery parameters, which the field leach trial is designed to establish,'' the company said.
"Curnamona Energy is confident, however, based on its extensive drilling to date, that Oban contains sufficient sand-hosted uranium to support a modest ISL operation for many years.''


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