Salamanca uranium mine takes delivery of its Sandvik primary crusher

Berkeley Energia has achieved a key milestone in the construction of the Salamanca mine, following the delivery of the primary crusher to site. The 400 t/h crusher was manufactured by Sandvik Group in Finland, one of the world’s leading suppliers and was one of the long lead items included in the use of proceeds from the equity raise completed in Q4 2016. It is a Sandvik CJ613 machine.

This jaw crusher has a feed opening of 1,300×1,130 mm. It weighs 41.5 t and has a motor power of 160 kW.

Berkeley Energia Managing Director Paul Atherley: “The arrival of the crusher marks a significant milestone during the current construction phase for the Salamanca mine, the only major uranium mine in construction in the world today. The mine will be one of the world’s lowest cost and one of the ten largest producers when in production.

“There are currently some 70 staff and contractors at site. This number will quickly ramp up as construction continues. We are encouraged by the local support and continue to recruit heavily from the local community and are delighted that people we have trained are now being offered employment.”

The project is capable of generating strong after tax cash flows through the current low point in the uranium cycle. It has a NPV of $531.9 million  with an IRR of 60% based on a discount rate of 8%.

The DFS reported that over an initial ten year period the project is capable of producing an average of 4.4 Mlb/y of uranium at a cash cost of $13.30/lb and a total cash cost of $15.06/lb during steady state operations.

With operating costs almost exclusively in Euros and a revenue stream in US dollars the company says the project “is expected to continue to benefit from the effects of deflationary pressures within the EU.”