Sybella Benchmarking vs Peers, page-155

Rob may be talking about a smaller throughput, 250-350m sounds about right for a 10 mtpa heap leach. But any reduction in CAPEX will translate into higher IRR (which is already relatively high) and higher NPV8. See LIN's Kagankunde recent study for a REE project with low CAPEX and high IRR - their recent PFS which had a very high IRR resulted in +45% share price gain on release and now sitting on $150m mcap.

One key recent development which may benefit Sybella is the recently announced 10% production tax credit for critical minerals (including REO). If eligible, new projects get a 10% tax credit on processing costs which can be off the tax bill or a cash rebate if the company doesn't pay tax. So essentially 10% reduction in OPEX for the first 10 years of the mine. Arufura were one of the industry partners on the policy. https://amec.org.au/ptc-resources/


So government backing, such as cheap debt funding (see: Eneabba, Arufura, Hastings, Northern Minerals, ASM) or outright contributions (see Lynas Texas refineries, ARR) and OPEX rebates (tax credits) will give Australian projects like Sybella an advantage over non-Western peers such as LIN, MEI and VMM.