Nolans Project
Project Details
Arafura's development of the Nolans Rare Earths (RE) Project will encompass a Mine, Beneficiation Plant, Extraction Plant, Separation Plant and related infrastructure to be constructed and located at the Nolans site in the Northern Territory. The Nolans site is located on Aileron Station, approximately 135 kilometres NNW of Alice Springs.
The cornerstone of the Nolans project is a large, low risk, 56 million tonne JORC-compliant mineral resource at surface and has been determined by drilling to extend to depths beyond 220 metres. The Company holds secure mineral title over the entire project area.
The Nolans mining operation will use conventional open-pit truck and excavator mining methods, supplemented by drilling and blasting for ore and waste. Pit optimisation studies have generated schedules showing a mine life beyond 20 years. A strategic mining schedule is based on an average mining rate of 5 million tonnes per annum to produce 525,000 tonnes of ROM ore each year.
The project’s process flowsheet has been developed by the Company from detailed, extensive and rigorous testing through a number of phases of laboratory, pilot plant and demonstration plant scales. Beneficiation will comprise crushing, grinding, and flotation to produce a blended mineral concentrate. Concentrate will be pumped to an adjacent Extraction Plant. REs will be extracted from the concentrate by chemical processing to produce a mixed RE intermediate product for refining at the adjacent Separation Plant. All waste rock, tailings, process residues and radionuclide retention will be confined to the Nolans site.
The Nolans mine site is located 10 kilometres west of the Stuart Highway, and 65 kilometres west of the Darwin-Adelaide railway. The Amadeus Basin to Darwin natural gas pipeline passes directly adjacent to the Extraction and Separation plants and within 5 kilometres of the mine. Access roads to and around the Nolans site have been positioned, site buildings have been specified, and a 400-person accommodation village has been conceptually designed. Raw and potable water sources adequate to service the life-of-operation have been identified SW and W of the Extraction Plant.
The infrastructure requirements for the Nolans project have been well defined through work undertaken to date on roads, buildings, communications, and power and water supply. A power plant will be co-located with the Extraction Plant and a conservative approach has been taken to power generation requirements.
The proximity of the project to Alice Springs provides an opportunity to base much of the project’s maintenance and operations infrastructure associated with its road transport operations in Alice Springs.
The Company expects around 90,000 tonnes per annum of in-bound raw materials to be delivered to the Nolans site, mostly as intermodal cargo. Most inbound reagents will be containerised. Inbound sulphur will be containerised in Darwin and delivered to an on-site sulphur burning acid plant that will produce sulphuric acid for the Extraction Plant. Hydrochloric acid will be shipped direct from suppliers or via Darwin in dedicated ISO tank containers for on-forwarding to Nolans. Out-bound RE product cargos will use the backhaul capability of the road and rail capacity and the Port of Darwin infrastructure. They will be packed in bulk bags and transported in standard shipping containers via Darwin and international shipping routes to customers.
Arafura is targeting 14,000 tonnes of total rare earth oxide (TREO) output each year through the sale from Nolans of three high-quality separated RE products and a fourth, less refined RE product. Most of the revenue from the project will be generated by the separated RE oxide products that feed the highest value segments of the market with the strongest demand outlook. NdPr oxide is in high demand from Japanese, Chinese, Korean and European metal, alloy and magnet producers for use in the automotive, clean energy, consumer electronics, military, robotics and healthcare sectors, and the Nolans project is strongly endowed in neodymium (Nd) and praseodymium (Pr) rare earths. NdPr oxide sales is anticipated to comprise some 85% of the project’s projected revenue.
The Company will also produce 110,000 tonnes of merchant grade phosphoric acid at the Nolans site each year for direct sale into the south Asian agricultural fertilizer market.
Arafura’s evaluation of the Nolans project indicates that it is financially robust and that it should provide a strong return on investment.
For more detailed information on the Nolans project download the Nolans Development Report or Project Fact Sheets listed below or visit www.arultd.com.
