Kodal Minerals PLC (LON:KOD) has completed a feasibility study for the Bougouni lithium project in Mali, and submitted its contents as part of a mining licence application to the relevant authorities.
The study envisages a project with a minimum 8.5-year mine life producing an average of 220,000 tonnes of 6% spodumene concentrate per annum.
Recoveries are expected to run at around 71%, based on laboratory metallurgical recoveries of 75%.
Life of mine revenues are expected to exceed USD$1.4bn, with an initial concentrate sale price of US$680 per tonne.
Kodal plans to build a two million tonnes per year processing plant utilising a conventional flotation circuit to maximise spodumene recovery:
The estimated cash costs ring in at USD$431 per tonne of concentrate and total capex is set at US$117mln plus contingency.
It all adds up to post tax net present value of approximately US$200mln, and an internal rate of return of 58%, or 51% post tax.
This is another significant step on our path to the development of the Bougouni lithium project,” said Kodal chief executive Bernard Aylward. “The lodging of the application marks the culmination of a period of intensive work by our project development team, led by Steve Zaninovich, and highlights the viability of a commercial mining operation at the project. The optimisation studies undertaken at Bougouni will be continued as this phase of work has highlighted significant opportunities to improve the proposed operation, as well as our continued focus on exploration and definition drilling, to further increase our resource base.”