@s33k3r - with respect to your question about "Investigation of potential secondary products from waste materials" noted as one of the project optimisation activities in the annual report, this concept was first raised back in June 2023 as part of the strategic action plan. More specifically, from the announcement on 13 June 2023:
- "Stantec, a global leader in sustainable design and engineering, has developed a new mineral processing circuit with potential to significantly lower the proposed Hawsons Iron Project’s capital and operating costs and could generate secondary revenues from the sale of ore-sands, thereby also reducing wastes." [emphasis added]
- "The revised comminution circuit design also has the potential to deliver additional by-product revenue from the production of ore-sands." [emphasis added]
- "the potential to improve tailings management substantially and generate revenue from the production of silicaore-sands [emphasis added] was a further attractive Environment Social and Governance (ESG) feature of the process."
- "We are working with The University of Queensland’s Sustainable Minerals Institute to explore by-product recovery and waste reduction opportunities, including ore-sands production." [emphasis added].
My recollection is that at around the time of that announcement I did a little research and thought it related to sand for construction purposes and thought that the cost of transport would likely exceed any revenue and therefore didn't put much credit or weight on the possibility of that being something that would add to the economics of the project. I think it the idea of an ore sands by product got a couple of small mentions after June 2023 and the idea seem to fade away. I didn't really give the comment in the annual report any thought until you raised the question.
While going back to find an announcement to refer you to I started to think about this further. Back in June 2023 there was someone else running Hawsons with Jeremy Kirkwood only having just been appointed (May 2023) and only as a non executive director. Now, we have Jeremy Kirkwood as Chairman and Tom Revy as CEO. Therefore, I don't think the potential of "secondary products from waste materials" would get a mention from those two people unless there is something in it.
On doing a little more research, sand with a high silica percentage is more valuable and has more uses than silica sand used for construction. Not sure if its something like this. Or it could be that with Tom Revy having a background as a metallurgist he has looked at the process and discovered another secondary product worth considering.
Secondary products from waste materials is not something that I am placing much weight or significance until we know more, but I am curious to see what may come about given the recent mention of secondary products from waste materials.
