ree projects, page-5

Hi 23Skidoo,

With Arafura’s project being fully Australian, I would also like to see it developed. It’s just unfortunate that its REEs are so hard to extract from the ore. If they make some metallurgical breakthroughs it might be worth a revisit, but it doesn’t look good.

Hi ozwire,

OK I’ll work through the main ASX listed REE companies and then move to the overseas ones. I’ll cover GGG first to provide a baseline for comparison with the other projects.

With regards to your post above, just remember that the Arafura ang GGG capex covers both the concentrator (producing REO concentrate) and the refinery (producing 99% pure REO).

I should also clarify that the Arafura’s total project capex is actually $1.9b – the $1.4b figure assumes that other companies build and operate $0.5b worth of infrastructure and then charge Arafura for its use. Of the $1.9b capex, $345m is for the Nolans Mine & Concentrator (to produce 5% REO) and $1.35b is for the Whyalla rare earth processing plant (to produce partially separated REO). These numbers are far too high for a project with only 20ktpa output of light REEs. The project NPV falls to zero at a basket price of $28/kg – they don’t have much room to move.

Cheers

PS - Please also note that my previous post incorrectly stated the Arafura ASX code as “AFU” instead of “ARU”.