Celsius Resources Ltd (ASX:CLA, AIM:CLA) managing director Peter Hume tells Proactive's Stephen Gunnion the company has achieved a significant milestone by being granted a mining permit for the MCB project, marking a pivotal transition from exploration to mineral resource development.
Proactive: You've been granted a mining permit for MCB. So a big milestone for Celsius.
Peter Hume: It's a huge milestone. I mean, we've been working towards this milestone for a number of years now. Obviously, permitting is not an easy thing to get through for any mining project around the world. But we've been able to hit that milestone in a reasonable amount of time.
Proactive: So this obviously marks a progression from an exploration company to a mineral resource developer, Peter, tell us more about what you'll be developing. Tell us more about the MCB project.
Peter Hume: But the MCB project, and going back a few years, we purchased these assets here in the Philippines predominantly from Freeport McMoRan. So Freeport had spent a fair bit of money here, there was a moratorium on mining in the Philippines for some time. And when they left the Philippines, we were able to pick these assets up, they were fairly well-advanced at that stage. It's not just the MCB project. But there are other projects here in the Philippines as well. And it's a copper Porphyry. The grade is reasonably high. We've put two job resource estimates out in the marketplace now. The last one totals around 300 million tonnes an average grade for the first 10 years of mining above 1% Copper, along with gold. So it is a very exciting time. It's an underground operation that we've done a feasibility study on, and it's we've taken it along a sustainable path or approach where we're not using a conventional tailings dam, we're using paste in hydraulic backfill. And we're using dried stacking methodology which we're lucky that the resource has no mind after draining. So it allows us to put on those sorts of characteristics into the project. So very exciting project.
Proactive: Tell us more about the permit itself, it is valid for 25 years, I understand, renewable for another 25 years. And what was the scope of the permits? What does it give you the right to do.
Peter Hume: The scope of the permit allows us to continue to explore, in particular in the area where we're going to mine because while we've done some very extensive drilling between ourselves and Freeport, there are other assets that sit along beside it, which would expand the overall mineral resource extensively. It allows us to start early works, and it allows us to develop and operate the mine. So it's pretty much all-inclusive in relation to the permit. The permit also has responsibilities in there for sustainable development, or ESG. Or that from that point of view, requirements for environmental social aspects. And then we've also entered into separate milestones in relation to ESG aspects which the national government is focusing on at the moment.
Proactive: What are the next steps?
Peter Hume: So the next steps, we've been doing a lot of planning, in particular in relation to what the next steps are. So there's a lot of compliance activities that we need to get involved in. We have been engaging with finances for the last 18 months or so. A lot of those finances are now knocking on our door now that we have the permit, because you know, the Philippines has a reputation of not issuing permits very easily. So while there was a lot of funding interest, those funders were commonly saying, Please come back and talk to us once you've got a permit. So now's the time to move forward. We've got a fair range of selection in relation to funding for the project. But we're balancing those up at the moment on which one we should go with to move forward. We'll start early work. There's some detailed design that we have to do as well. Some further permitting around construction activities, tree cutting, a water permit that we have to get, but predominantly all the larger permits are done.
Proactive: And your thoughts on the copper price at the moment, Peter. Take us through the market dynamics and where you see it going?
Peter Hume: It's a very interesting market at the moment. undoubtedly, and we've been watching the long-range forecasts for some time now in relation to where copper might Go. Certainly, with the big green push, and companies or countries signing up to, you know, environmental controls aspects, we see that the long-range outlook on Copper has been very positive. It may not go to some of the long-range predictions because I think that's probably just a bit too high. But certainly, around 13,000 to 15,000 a tonne will not be out of the question. That's just my personal view.
Proactive: Peter, an exciting day for the company. Thank you very much for coming on and discussing. I hope you'll keep us posted on any developments.
Peter Hume: We will as we progress through the next phases. So thank you very much.