WA critical minerals explorer St George Mining latches on to advanced niobium project in Brazil

WA critical minerals explorer St George Mining has latched on to an advanced niobium project in Brazil, which it hopes to bring into production in about three years. St George told the ASX on Tuesday it had locked in firm commitments to raise $21.25 million to fund the acquisition of the Araxa niobium-rare earths elements project in the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais. Speaking to the Kalgoorlie Miner at the Diggers & Dealers Mining Forum in Kalgoorlie-Boulder, St George executive chairman John Prineas said niobium was a bright spot in the “tough” critical minerals space. St George has various lithium, nickel and copper projects in the State, including the Mt Alexander project in the northern Goldfields. WA’s nickel industry has crashed on the back of a flood of cheap Indonesian nickel into the global market, and the lithium price has fallen 75 per cent so far this year. However, Mr Prineas emphasised the Brazil move did not signal a move away from its suite of projects in WA. “We are always looking for something to bolt on to our portfolio,” he said. He said a key issue was that the company’s WA projects were in the early stages of development, whereas Araxa had been comprehensively explored, with more than 500 drill intercepts of niobium at grades of more than one per cent. He said Araxa was right next to the niobium mine of CBMM, a company which produced about 80 per cent of the world’s niobium, and this meant the region had established infrastructure and a labour force in place. Mr Prineas said these factors gave St George confidence in Araxa, and it was was aiming to generate a JORC-compliant resource in the first half of next year, with an eye to production in two to three years. St George shares rose more than 20 per cent on the news on Tuesday morning, and closed the day up 20.6 per cent at 4.1¢. Mr Prineas said this reaction reflected investor appetite for niobium on the back of the success of WA1 Resources in WA’s West Arunta region. He also said while global share markets were struggling this week, good projects such as Araxa “will shine through”. “The market sees the value in them,” he said. Mr Prineas said niobium was traditionally used to strengthen steel so it was used in the construction of large buildings and bridges. However, there were also emerging applications in medical equipment such as MRI machines, and electric vehicle batteries. He said putting niobium into electric vehicle batteries allowed them to charge faster and have a much longer life.

WA critical minerals explorer St George Mining latches on to advanced niobium project in Brazil

The No. 1 source of news for every West Australian

Subscribe

Subscribe