Another article in the Australian. So you were looking around...

Another article in the Australian. So you were looking around the AUD$20k/t to re-open.
Funny if they got it and the Ni price jumped to US$10lb!!! LOL.



BHP Billiton may be preparing to offload its disastrous Ravensthorpe nickel project in Western Australia.

BHP's Ravensthorpe nickel operation. Picture: Bloomberg
Ravensthorpe was mothballed iinto care and maintenance in January following a dive in nickel prices, with the loss of more than 1800 jobs.

Since then, BHP Billiton has been undertaking a wide-ranging study of all possible options for the assets.

Ravensthorpe shire president Brenda Tilbrook said that in recent weeks there were indications the operation would be sold-off by BHP Billiton.

"There have been mining companies and investors recently looking at the mine," Ms Tilbrook said.
"There have been a couple of mining companies that have an interest in nickel and some Asian investors," she said.

Ms Tilbrook said people who were still working at the mine site had reported there had been vistors to the mine in the past few weeks.

She said BHP had made "outrageous promises" to locals about Ravensthorpe and the community was harmed by the mine closure.

"One thousand people have left the community in the past five months, so of course when you have only got 2400 people that is a very significant group of people leaving," she said.

Independent analyst Peter Strachan said BHP had written down the worth of Ravensthorpe to zero on its balance sheet.

"They have clearly made the decision it is worthless to them and they have closed it down," he said.

Mr Strachan said BHP would probably seek a nickel price of about $US20,000 a tonne before it would consider reopening the site, and the current price was $US19,235 a tonne.

He said anyone wanting to make Ravensthorpe a viable operation would probably need to spend at least $300 million and have the means to process concentrate from the mine.

"Someone might come in and say if I am buying this for a dollar all I have to do is stump up with the working capital to get it working again and to do a feasibility study," he said.

"The processing plant is all basically spanking new and it wouldn't be that difficult to restart it."

A BHP Billiton spokesman said the company never commented on speculation.