All they have said is that sale of the 26% would be at "fair...

All they have said is that sale of the 26% would be at "fair value" - this leaves a lot of issues open. Usually there is a Discounted Cash flow (DCF) calculation that looks at future anticipated earning and discounts (at an agreed percentage) back to the date of the transaction. The agreement was signed in 2021 (but was in draft form prior to that date". Since interest dates at the time were low I would expect something like 7% as the DCF value - but I really have no idea. On the above basis my DCF calculator values the GLE 26% option at US$469m.

The other way of look at the valuation is that Cameco in their 2009 accounts wrote off US$197m - at that time the U3O8 spot price was about US$50/lb so on that ratio the Cameco 24% interest would be valued at about twice that amount or about US$400m. However since 2009 development has advanced considerably (the vital Beam Control system has been developed) and over much of that intervening period Cameco was only paying 24% of the costs (SLX paid 76% of the Lucas heights costs from July 2014 to 2020) and reimbursed GEH for their costs from July 2016 onwards.

The significance of the Beam Control system should not be underestimated - the v3 resonance frequency of 235UF6 is (according to Snyder) 15.916 μm whilst for 238UF6 its 15.931 μm - this shows that the infrared beam frequency stability is vital and needs to be very accurately and firmly held (hence the need to the Beam Control system). LIS Technologies are using a sub-hamonic of V3/3 - they will have a more difficult problem since the frequency tolerance is one third of that at the fundamental (i.e the difference between 15.916 μm and 15.931 μm) and this harmonic the photon absorption of UF6 is also about 5000 times less (see their patent (chapter 30) HERE)

My assumption (I may well be wrong) is that the separator is a stationary wall centrifuge (or something similar) with tangential Laval nozzles (similar to Klydon - see below)

15.931 μm


My other guess is that the laser beams are fed from both end of the tube (hence the requirement for two lasers - see announcement HERE) and that the path length is improved (thus allowing adequate absorption of the laser energy by the 235UF6/G) using Herroit cell mirrors with lasers at both end of the tube (see below for how a Herroitt cell works)



These are just my guesses - I have not been on the inside of any of these development - it's just what I have read and surmised. The other important issue is the "shaping of the laser beam" (normally the intensity of a laser beam across its axis will be Gaussian) to something that look s like the figure below (ref Laser Isotope Separation with Shaped LightAndrew Forbes and Lourens Botha)



Without shaping the laser beams (I assume sited at each end of the separator) there would be over exposure in the middle of the beam (causing dissociation of the UF6 (into UF5+F) and under exposure at the edges (i.e failing to adequately excite the UF6 - to break dimers of UF6/G into monomers of UF6 & G)

What I am trying to emphasize is that laser isotope separation development is "difficult" (as demonstrated by the failed attempts since the 1970's and the $Bn's spent of research) - hopefully SLX have cracked the problems (we shall see with the TRL/6 demo hopefully this year) - 26% of a successful prototype will be worth a lot! it's also a geo-strategic issue for the USA (and thus Australia) to get ahead of the Russians and Chinese (the US can't beat them on labour costs) - the west needs a technical edge to stay ahead!!