Ann: Bekisopa Southern Zone Mineral Resource, page-18

Ok, so I had a call with Paul today, he was very generous with his time, and I was able to ask him all of the questions.

Nothing here is price sensitive, just interesting with relation to timelines (which are subject to change) for various stages / phases / milestones.

Answers are below.

I had a similar thought about the 2mm crush VS the DRI 75 micron grind. There's a point of diminishing returns, and I'd imagine it would also be dependent on scale beyond 2mtpa.
The 2mm crush VS 75 micron DRI grinding will be determined by WAI. The DRI timelines will also be dependent on the demand for DRI in the market (apparently it is a thing, but it isn't that much of a thing at the moment, also prices are hard to find, and there for hard to do modelling and justify the investment).

Has the work on the PFS started yet, or is it dependent of the SS update?
SS started and is expected to run through to the end of September. Once that has been delivered the company and WAI will then go into PFS in October, which will probably take 12 - 15 months. The Weather station has been installed in order to capture the required 12 months of weather data.

Given northern and central zone drilling should be completed by mid September, I'm expecting it to be included in the PFS.
Yes. Delays were due to a number of things, the main ones being the questions around density and WAI were conservative given they need to sign off on the report. The other thing was the definition of the inferred "Green steel" resource.

When are you planning on drilling the other 70% of Bekisopa? Is there any plan to do that with funds from this raise? (I didn't see it in the plan, just want to confirm)
Not a high priority. The drilling is based on the Bekisopa EM survey where the company selected the most protective areas. Will there be value from proving up more resource elsewhere, like Satrokala and Tratramarina.

I'm assuming the DRI resource is inferred because the infill drilling didn't go deep enough to change it to indicated. If so, how much deeper than where the DSO finishes does the DRI start?
Yes it is inferred because it is based on the 2021 drilling campaign and the infill drilling did not go that deep

I'll ask him if I can send the timeline I created in the "general discussion" thread for him to comment on (probably unlikely to agree to that, but may get a "of all things go well, that may be possible"). At a worst case, maybe it'll give him some idea for announcements that are relevant to investors.
He said no worries, so I will send it over when i get a bit more time.

I saw the DRI power requirements for both the DSO and the DRI plants. DRI will take about 10MW of power, is there the current infrastructure to supply this? Which follows on with could power supply play a role in how quickly we could scale to DRI mining?

Bekisopa is like being in the outback of WA, there may be roads, but there are no powerlines. Power will be a consideration, hence the preference for solar and diesel generation for backup. Also the cost is coming down, and stability is improving. There are a number of solar farms in Madagascar. RIO recently launched (I think he said launched???), their solar farm for one of their mines.

When is the Satrokala EM survey expected to start?
Next 6 - 10 weeks. Permitting being worked on. 10 weeks to do the survey and get the report. Once analysis is done a plan will be created for which areas to drill first

When is the exploratory drilling at Satrokala expected to start? How big a program (holes and metres) is out likely to be? Will it be for the whole 10km strike or just a portion depending on the magnetic strength?
~800m of exploratory drilling expected in October, after the EM survey has been completed and the report analysed.

If Satrokala drilling is expected before December, is there the possibility for the resource definition drilling and assays (4 months - March, then analysis = 2 months), the maiden resource drilling and assays (4 months), and infill drilling and assays (4 months) to be completed and a maiden DSO resource for there to be included in the PFS? (Ambitious timelines that is contingent on there actually being a DSO resource for "one zone" there, sure, but it could just be for a small portion. It's probably also weather dependent). A bit of pressure never killed anyone lol
Paul understood where I was going with this, and said it is a good train of thought. It will all be dependent on the results of the EM survey and exploratory drilling to define the bounds of the resource. They might drill at 1km intervals and then select a highly prospective area to increase drill density in the attempt to identify an area in which the company could do infill drilling to ultimately try and define an inferred or potentially indicated or measure resource - preferably in time for the PFS release in 12 - 15 months time (probably 15 months is my expectation).

I hope this helps.

Lots of things to start in the coming weeks and months.