Boss Energy has announced it has commenced mining operations at its Honeymoon uranium project in South Australia.
The company has said it is on track for first production in the December quarter with the first wellfield being pre-conditioned.
Pre-conditioning effectively cleans the wellfields of unwanted chlorides and calcium prior to uranium being extracted.
Boss has completed major construction activities at Honeymoon including wellfield development, gypsum repository construction, water treatment and reverse osmosis plant commissioning.
“It is a testament to the hard work and effort undertaken by all Boss employees over many years to reach today’s pivotal milestone– the commencement of mining activities on Honeymoon,” Boss managing director Duncan Craib said.
Mining operations at Honeymoon were previously suspended in November 2013 in response to falling uranium prices.
Since acquiring the Honeymoon project in December 2015, Boss embarked on a series of technical optimisation studies to improve Honeymoon’s position as a globally competitive mining operation in a Tier 1 location.
The company said the project development is proceeding to plan and remains on time and on budget as Boss moves towards the restart of Honeymoon in the next few months.
The uranium market is continuing to tighten and the spot price is moving up, now trading at decade highs of US$69 per pound ($107/lb).
Boss recently revealed plans to grow its Honeymoon uranium project in South Australia with two new satellite prospects.
Results from scout drilling revealed a significant potential for more uranium at the Billeroo and Sunrise prospects just 80km from Honeymoon.
The production commencement also follows Boss’ announcement on October 3rd that it has won an application to explore a potential new uranium province in South Australia.
The mineral rights are held in a shared arrangement with copper developer Coda Minerals, covering four highly prospective tenements from the Murray Basin’s Kinloch project located around 130km from Honeymoon.