Against the backdrop of surging demand for nuclear energy, Elevate Uranium (ASX: EL8) is aggressively advancing its portfolio of projects..
Sentiment for uranium is the highest it’s been in more than a decade as global governments ramp up plans for new nuclear reactors as part of the energy transition.
“There’s no better time to be in uranium with demand for nuclear and demand for uranium growing,” Elevate managing director Murray Hill said.
“The only way to incentivise new uranium production is for the price to go north and that’s where we think it’s going to go.”
Elevate is the largest uranium landholder in Namibia, holding nine licenses covering 2423 square kilometres, including the 58 Mlb
Koppies project, which is just 25km from the world- class Langer Heinrich uranium mine..
“We chose Namibia because it’s a great uranium mining jurisdiction,” Hill said.
Three new uranium mines have been developed in Namibia in the past 16 years.
As well as already being the world’s third- largest uranium producer, Namibia continues to be extremely prospective, as evidenced by Elevate’s recent exploration success. The company has made four discoveries in just four years.
The first of those discoveries is Elevate’s flagship Koppies project, where the company reported an inferred resource estimate of
134.6 million tonnes at 195 parts per million uranium oxide for 58 million pounds of uranium oxide over 20km of mineralisation.
Koppies was discovered at an all-in cost of just US6.8c per pound of uranium.
“I don’t think I’ve heard anyone mention US6.8c/lb to find a uranium project anywhere in the world, so that’s an exceptionally low exploration cost, and the reason being is that we’re drilling holes that are generally about 28m deep,” Hill said.
The resource is incredibly shallow with half sitting within 7m of surface and 95% sitting within 18.5m of surface, which is expected to lead to a low stripping ratio and low costs.
Elevate has drilled more than 1200 holes at Koppies since the April 2024 resource update, with the goal of upgrading the resource from inferred to indicated.
Innovative process
As well as a uranium explorer and developer, Elevate has also developed its own patented ore beneficiation process, called U-pgrade™, which is suitable for use on calcrete-hosted uranium projects, including those in Elevate’s portfolio.
U-pgrade™ increases uranium grades by removing waste and reduces acid consumption for cost and environmental benefits.
Elevate excavated eight test pits at Koppies in the June quarter to collect ore samples for U-pgrade™ beneficiation test work.
Excavation of the shallow test pits exposed large areas of the bright yellow uranium mineral carnotite, which Elevate says will have positive implications for the test work.
The six tonnes of material have been sent to Perth for the work, with the results to be used to design a pilot plant to be run in Namibia next year.
A previous scoping study on the Marenica
project showed the U-pgrade™ process reduced costs by roughly 50% compared to conventional processing.
Hill described U-pgrade™ as an industry leading process.
Aggressive exploration
Aside from three drill rigs at Koppies, Elevate is also drilling elsewhere.
Hirabeb, another of Elevate’s recent discoveries, is just 25km from the southern portion of the Koppies resource.
Recent drilling returned results including 15.5m at 599ppm uranium oxide; 12m at 451ppm uranium oxide; 7.5m at 616ppm uranium oxide; and 4m at 1198ppm uranium oxide.
A drill rig is on site working towards the estimation of a maiden resource later this year.
A two-phased greenfields and infill drilling program is also in progress at the Capri project, 25km from Marenica.
The program has resulted in multiple intersections above 250ppm uranium oxide.
All up, Elevate has five rigs drilling Monday to Friday each week in Namibia, drilling about five holes each a day.
“How many people can say they’re drilling 125 holes a week?” Hill said.
Elevate also holds uranium resources in the Northern Territory. Follow-up drilling is planned at both the Angela and Minerva projects in 2025.
Elevate’s joint venture partner, Energy Metals, recently launched a resource extension program at the Bigrlyi project in the NT.
All up, Elevate has a resource inventory of 152Mlb of uranium, comprising 104Mlb in Namibia and 48Mlb in Australia, a number Hill expects will grow.
“We expect to find more – I’m not happy with four discoveries in four years. I want more,” he said.
The company expects to maintain the high level of activity throughout the remainder of 2024 and remains well-funded to do so with cash and cash equivalents of A$10.8 million at the end of June.
