Mid West vanadium play Australian Vanadium in the running for $45m in US funding
Simone GroganThe West Australian
Mon, 23 September 2024 3:16PM
Graham Arvidson, CEO of Australian Vanadium. Credit: DAVID BROADWAY/RegionalHUB
A West Perth minnow with hopes of building a $600 million vanadium processing plant in a tiny Mid West town has got a look-in on the United State’s critical minerals funding spree.
The Export-Import Bank of the United States wrote to Australian Vanadium last week advising it was considering lending the explorer $US31 million ($45.4m) for its namesake project.
The potential funding support will be subject to due diligence and can be increased if AVL steps up its use of US goods and services in developing the project.
It comes after the US Government’s Department of Energy dished out a combined $500m in grants to listed global miner South32 and Osborne Park explorer Element 25 to start building a pipeline of manganese supplies.
China’s dominance in refining minerals needed in the critical arenas of defence and energy has spurred Western countries to start becoming more self-reliant.
AVL’s plans to start mining vanadium 40km south of Meekatharra — and later refine the ore at a yet-to-be-built processing plant at the town of Tenindewa 100km east of Geraldton — have been in the works since 2015.
Vanadium is mainly used as a steel alloy but the commodity had garnered increased attention in recent years since gaining “critical” status from the Australian and US Federal Governments, based around its potential use in vanadium batteries.
AVL is banking on the widespread adoption of the commodity in long-life renewable energy storage products, predominantly vanadium redox flow batteries. Its proposed operation has been granted major project status at a Federal level and lead-agency designation with the State Government, and the Graham Arvidson-led company is shoring up funds and studies to eventually get the project going.
The latest construction start date for the project is next year in 2025. There are currently no operating vanadium mines in Australia.
“Receiving support from agencies such as EXIM to help fund the Project demonstrates its advanced and significant nature,” Mr Arvidson said.
“Vanadium is classed as both a critical and battery mineral, with countries around the world looking to establish secure supply chains. Working with the United States aligns with the Australian Federal Government’s strategic goals for the critical and battery mineral industries.”
Pushing forward on clean energy and shared critical minerals supply chains were key talking points between Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and US President Joe Biden in their Delaware meeting at the weekend.
“Australia and the United States continue to cooperate closely on climate and clean energy and remain committed to our shared goal of expanding and diversifying critical mineral supply chains,” the prime minister affirmed on Saturday.
US Ambassador to Australia Caroline Kennedy in April said the US export credit agency had been “looking for new projects in Australia.”
AVL merged with Technology Metals at the start of 2024 in a scrip exchange worth about $217 million the packaged ownership of the vanadium orebody they shared in the Mid West.
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