The proposal was raised at the lower end of the iron commodity trough compounded by the low Vanadium price. Didnt stay on the table for long as clearly TNG was miles off EIS approvals and permitting. By the time commodity prices started to turn and the TNG/ SMS link was made public in 2016 then the focus has centered on ECA assisted finance coupled up development of the Darwin TIVAN Refinery as a proto type to demonstrate the hydro metallurgical process.
The fact remains that Mt Peake Mine can stand alone and there are of course sources of finance to pursue to get it in production. There is the Catapilar MOU of 2016(?) and the Downers MOU borh of which include potential finance conditions. There is also the potential NAIF assistance as almost half the CAPEX is for infrastructure.
Obviously there was a number of downsides to the proposal especially on the bottom line as Mt peake mine doesn't have huge grades but it has massive un measured reserves that were ignored for scoping and DFS purposes.
What seems to be lining up is an SMS aproved ECP, substantially financed from ECA conditional design and component construction undertaken by SMS in Europe with only on site assembly in Australia. For that SMS get to take many slices on the way through to production but in return give a guarantee on not only TIVAN viability but component quality construction and timing. All pretty tidy really. No wonder they been around 150 years and a leader in the field. If they played rugby the all blacks wouldn't stand a chance.
anyway these are just my thought putting lines between some dots. History shows that caution is ones best friend not my thoughts.
Time will reveal all.
