Encanto Potash Corp. has appointed Richard Lively to the position of Chief Operating Officer. “Since joining Encanto, Lively has shown great ingenuity to bring the Muskowekwan potash project forward”, commented CEO Stavros Daskos.
He will continue working towards analyzing the potential of lowering Capex, creating efficiency in Opex with a goal of reducing the construction costs and strategically optimizing transportation costs, and maintaining reasonable engineering costs. Under Lively’s guidance, Encanto will initialize the engineering plan immediately, and move the project towards the construction stage.
Encanto will imminently engage an engineering firm to perform a value engineering analysis in efforts to lower the project’s total Capex. To move the project to detailed design and engineering, Encanto will use the summer months to complete the value analysis. Encanto also expects to have a finalized EIS gap analysis by end of summer 2018, laying out the next 12 months of EIS work to finalize the study.
With three plus decades of experience, Lively will help Encanto create an efficient project design, in the endeavour to deliver value-maximized potash for the 20 years of production needed to supply the off-take with NACOF. With this added experience, Encanto is positioned to manage in-house key development engineering costs for the immediate project steps such as addressing EIS deficiencies. Lively states, “By managing project design and staying in control, we can avoid costly overruns, duplication, delays, and high engineering costs. I believe in the model of having vendors and engineering firms compete and offer fair fees to come in line with Encanto’s budget.”
“With both the engineering and environmental analysis to be completed this summer, we are working towards a construction start in November 2019. Our new COO has joined the Encanto team to see this plan forward. By optimizing the design, we will have a stellar operation and can compete in the near future as well as long term in this tight potash market”, states Daskos.
Encanto Potash is a TSX Venture Exchange listed and traded Canadian resource company engaged in the development of potash properties in the Province of Saskatchewan, Canada, the largest producing potash region in the world. Through a joint venture agreement with Muskowekwan Resources Ltd, Encanto has secured a project land package which totals approximately 61,000 largely contiguous acres. It aims to use solution mining. PFS dated February 28, 2013 titled Encanto Potash Corp. Technical Report Summarizing the Preliminary Feasibility Study for the Muskowekwan First Nations Home Reserve Project in South Eastern Saskatchewan, Canada confirms the Proven and Probable KCI Reserves totalling 162 Mt grading 28% KCl (average) which supports primary and secondary mining for over 50 years at an assumed annual rate extraction rate of 2.8 Mt of MOP. The PEA dated May 24, 2017 titled NI 43-101 Technical Report on a Preliminary Economic Assessment and Preliminary Feasibility Study of the Muskowekwan Potash Project, South-Eastern Saskatchewan, Canada summarizes an alternative development option that supports primary and secondary mining of the Mineral Resources for 48 years at an annual extraction rate of 3.4 Mt of MOP. On December 30, 2016, Encanto signed a 20-year off-take agreement with the National Federation of Farmers’ Procurement, Processing, and Retailing Cooperatives of India Ltd., (NACOF) registered under the Ministry of Agriculture, Government of India to supply 5 Mt/y of potash.
