Valuing HCH, page-39

Well they could well do a scoping study on the current resource estimate.
Scoping study essentially defines the scope of the operation - open pit vs underground, mining method, logistics routes, environmental impact, indicated NPV etc. They could do all that now with the current resource without any drama - all the findings would flow through to the BFS later down the track. An increase in the resource will mean larger pits and a larger fleet, and will likely mean the layout of the mine is changed (eg. pit design, waste dump design) but the scoping study basically asks "Can it be done and how?" So an increase in the ore reserves won't change the material impact of the scoping study.

So they could well get a scoping study underway this year. Depending on the details, might take anywhere from 3-9 months.
Just to be clear - All 3 together would take about 2 years all up* (not 2 years each). And the company may not necessarily decide to go through with all 3 - I've worked for companies who did a single study and that's all they needed to pull the trigger.

The BFS is done based on the final resource and is usally done by the company planning to mine it - realistically there shouldn't be any more drilling once they are at this phase. This is when the fine-tuned pit design is done, waste dump design complete, roads etc, processing infrastructure, all environmental impacts understood and risks mitigated, fleet selection finalised, LOM schedule completed, and target costs and NPV estimated to a confidence of within 5-10%. A good solid BFS could take anywhere from 6 months to a year depending on requirements and size of the team working on the study.
I would expect this to be paid for by a JV or after a Takeover, unless CE moves to turn HCH into a mining company itself.

But for now, I'm more interested in watching the resource jump to over 1Bt and going Tier 1.