pros and cons

Ive been watching this stock for a little while and i was wondering what others opinions others had formed re. the potential risk vs. reward?

Pros (From what I can see, although I am exteremly green at this game): mlm management seems pretty solid.
cash/assets of about $50m.
Decent deposit of Ni-Co close to infrastructure
Heavy mineral sand exploration potential

But the biggest positive I can see is two of the three significant Sc deposits in the world, with almost $5 billion of the metal insitu. And looking at the track record of JRV (who have a larger deposit with a higher grade in laterite ores) I would be surprised if the alternative, nsw deposit is able to produce within the stated time frame or be able to source the funding required. However their JV partner (EMC: TSX) seems pretty aggressive and the driving force behind the project.

I feel that any major reliable supply of Sc would change its market completely. Sporting goods and aerospace aluminium alloy potential for one, with Airbus stating that use of said alloy would reduce the weight and cost of producing a plane by 15% each. I have also started looking at SOFCs and natural gas/coal energy production and wow.


Cons: laterite deposit (and I understand that these are associated with difficulties, especially BHP's 3 billion dollar write off in W.A.)

HPAL processing plant - On top of the often prohibitive capex, opex and history of operating problems using this method (the only successful ni-co laterite mine using this process seems to be murri murri in w.a.), treating the scandium with this may potentially render it useless for SOFCs due to the faster degradation of energy production associated with sulphur (the acid used is sulphuric acid I believe)(See SECA's research into using SOFC's with coal).

I was thinking that it may be possible to consider bringing Direct Nickel in and using their patented nitric acid laterite ore processing method to lower the cost of production and render the mine more feasible. However I have no idea whether nitric acid can be used to separate scandium.

Also I would love to see a Dni/mlm jv takeover the jrv/ecm j.v. and effectively become a monopoly in short term supply of Sc.