Abu Dabbab Tantalum
Introduction
The 44.5 million tonne Abu Dabbab tantalum-tin-feldspar deposit is located within the Central Eastern Desert in Egypt. The deposit is located about 16km inland from the western shore of the Red Sea. The deposit is covered by two Exploitation Leases (1658 & 1659) granted in the name of Tantalum Egypt JSC, a company incorporated in Egypt and owned 50% by the Egyptian Government via the Egyptian Mineral Resources Authority (EMRA) and 50% by Tantalum International Pty Ltd which is a 100% owned subsidiary of Gippsland Ltd.
Tantalum applications
Tantalum is a grey metal, classed as a refractory metal because it is resistant to chemical attack. For industrial use, its important properties are a high melting point, ductility which allows it to be drawn into wire, and malleability which allows sheets and tubes to be made. Once exposed to air, the metal is covered with a thin layer of oxide which allows it to resist fluids in the human body, and also acids and other corrosive liquids, in the chemical industry. It has a high dielectric, which makes it so valuable in capacitors for the electronics industry. Tantalum capacitors form an integral component in the production of mobile telephones, telecommunication infrastructure, laptop computers, auto-electrics plus still and video digital cameras.
Because of the metal’s resistance to corrosion it is used in chemical plant and equipment. Its high melting point (2,997°C) and low thermal coefficient of expansion make it a crucial component of jet engine turbine blades. As tantalum carbide, one of the hardest substances known to man, it is used for cutting tools.
Tantalum Market
The majority of the world’s tantalum is sold by way of long-term offtake agreements between the miner and the tantalum refiner/metal producer. Tantalum is not sold via a regulated market as is for gold, copper, zinc and tin. The global tantalum Ta2O5 market is estimated to be in the order of 5 - 7 million pounds per annum. Industry commentators suggest that the market is growing at a rate of about 7% per annum.
HC Starck GmbH, is generally considered to be the world’s leading tantalum concentrate consumer/processor followed (not in order) by Cabot Corporation (USA), Ulba OJSC (Kazakhstan), Mitsui-Kinzoku (Japan) and Ningxia Non-Ferrous Metals (China) plus various other Chinese groups.
Previous exploration
Tin-tungsten mineralisation at Abu Dabbab has been known since the 1940s but it was not explored until the early 1970s when a joint Soviet-Egyptian team, completed an extensive exploration programme. In the early 1990s the project was further explored by a joint venture between the Egyptian Government and Geominera Italiana. The previous work included 28 diamond drill holes, three adits, one crosscut, numerous trenches, surface sampling, bulk sampling and metallurgical tests. Gippsland carried out some re-sampling of the adits to verify the previous results, collected bulk samples totalling 43 tonnes which were used to conducted additional detailed metallurgical test work in Australia. Encouraged by the results of the test work, Gippsland commenced a Bankable Feasibility Study which was completed in October 2004 and updated in September 2008 by the international engineering Group Lycopodium Pty Ltd.
Geological setting
The Ta-Nb-Sn mineralisation of Abu Dabbab is represented by disseminated cassiterite and niobio-tantalite, hosted in a stock of apogranite. The apogranite at Abu Dabbab is leucocratic, holocrystalline, white grey to greenish blue and with manganese oxide spots and dendrites. It is mostly fine to medium grained and occasionally has a porphyritic texture.
The characteristic alteration processes in the apogranite are greisenisation, microclinisation, silicification and albitisation.
The shape of the host apogranite intrusion is generally ellipsoidal except in the north-western part where there is a narrow off-shoot, about 150m in length. The apogranite mass is elongate in an east-west direction with a maximum length of about 400m. Maximum width in a northeast-southwest direction is nearly 200m. The body extends about 130m above the level of the adits and has been intersected in drilling at a depth of 350m below the adits.
No significant disseminated mineralisation is present in the country rocks surrounding the intrusive mass, therefore the ore deposit limits correspond to the limits of the apogranitic body.
Resources
Abu Dabbab Mineral Resources (100g/t Ta2O5 cut-off)
Category Million Tonnes Ta2O5 (g/t) Sn grade(%)
Measured Mineral Resource
15.2
290
0.143%
Indicated Mineral Resource
17.3
250
0.078%
Inferred Mineral Resource
12
200
0.03%
Total Mineral Resource 44.5 250 0.09%
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http://www.gippslandltd.com/Projects/AbuDabbab.aspx
BeantwoordenVerwijderenhuidige koers ca 5 cent.
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BeantwoordenVerwijderenThursday, January 28, 2010
Gippsland Still Sees Tantalum Shortage By 2011, Expects Offtake Agreements For Abu-Dabbab Project Soon
Gippsland Limited (ASX: GIP, FRANKFURT: GIX) said the global tantalum market is still expected to experience a significant supply shortfall by 2011 and beyond despite the inflow of what it called cheap conflict tantalum from the Democratic Republic of Congo, which has forced a number of legitimate but high cost tantalum miners and projects including Talison’s Australian operations and Cabot Corporation’s Canadian Tanco operations out of business.
The company expects the tantalum supply shortfall to be further exacerbated by the constraints applied internationally to the use of conflict tantalum, mined by minors and adult workers under adverse conditions, to progressively exclude this material from the supply chain.
The unavailability of this kind of tantalum has sparked interest in the raw material from Gippsland’s Abu-Dabbab project with the company currently engaged in discussions with a number of major tantalum refiners over additional tantalum offtake and involvement in the project. Gippsland expects the shortage and the constraint on conflict tantalum usage to place it in a position to secure a long-term offtake agreement in the near future.
Gippsland already has an agreement with German tantalum refiner HC Starck GmbH for the delivery of conventional tantalum slags and concentrates. The two companies are currently in negotiations to vary the agreement for the delivery of a more valuable high purity synthetic tantalum concentrate (SynCon).
The Abu Dabbab Project has a JORC compliant mineral resource of 44.5 Mt (million tonnes) at a grade of 250 g/t (grammes per tonne) Ta2O5 (tantalum), while the Company's nearby Nuweibi tantalum deposit has a JORC mineral resource of 98 Mt at a grade of 147 g/t Ta2O5.
The total contained Ta2O5 content within the Abu Dabbab and Nuweibi deposits is 55 million pounds of Ta2O5, which Gippsland said was sufficient to satisfy global tantalum demand for more than a decade.
Abu Dabbab is scheduled to commence operations at an initial mill feed rate of 2 Mtpa (million tonnes per annum), producing in excess of 650,000 pounds of tantalum pentoxide per year, which by today's standards would make it the world's largest producer.
The company added that during sampling at its prospecting licenses in Eritrea, anomalous results for gold, copper and zinc were recorded from all of the three 100 sq km (square kilometre) licenses. Based on these results, the company has decided to double its holdings in Eritrea by applying for a further three 100 sq km prospecting licenses in the Adobha region.
During the quarter Gippsland completed a renounceable rights Issue to all shareholders to raise $3.87 million for the company before costs.
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De 'tan' in coltan komt van tantalum.
BeantwoordenVerwijderenDe naam coltan wordt vaak verkeerd gebruikt; het is echter geen metaal, maar een erts dat niobium en tantalum bevat.
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Tantalum; (previously known as tantalium) is a chemical element with the symbol Ta and atomic number 73. A rare, hard, blue-gray, lustrous transition metal, tantalum is highly corrosion resistant and occurs naturally in the mineral tantalite, always together with the chemically similar niobium. It is part of the refractory metals group, which are widely used as minor component in alloys. The chemical inertness of tantalum makes it a valuable substance for laboratory equipment and a substitute for platinum, but its main use today is in tantalum capacitors in electronic equipment.
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“Tantalite ore prices remained fairly constant at $40 per pound from 2007 into 2009, but starting midyear 2009 prices began to increase dramatically. In less than a year, tantalite ore prices more than doubled with the prices for Q1 2011 now coming in at $120 per pound and spot prices expected to touch $150 per pound,” stated Mary Ellen Bauchman, TTi Insights. TTi is an electronics manufacturer; these prices represent what suppliers pay for the materials.
BeantwoordenVerwijderenPhysical demand will continue as tantalum is irreplaceable in many of the high tech electronic products. The increase in demand from a rapidly urbanizing China alone will grow the consumer electronics market, putting added pressure on already thin tantalum supply. Acer, the world’s second largest PC vendor, expects “PC revenue would grow 10-15 percent next year, driven by growing demand from China and emerging markets,” reported Ken Wills, for Reuters.
The growth of these markets will fuel the price of tantalum in 2011. When coupled with the move away from tantalum sourced in Congo, the outlook for tantalum mining firms is strong. The outlook from tantalum consumers in the US is for dramatic price increases in 2011. Bauchman added, “The DRC “Conflict” region supply will effectively be taken off line on or before 3-31-11 thus reducing the overall available supply by 16% Tantalum demands will continue to increase driven by upside of needed components for wired communications equipment, laptop computers, 4G hand phones and other newer technology electronic components,” she went on to say that, “In the near term these manufacturers will have to replenish their supplies at current market prices of more than 2X their old cost structures resulting in large tantalum capacitor price increases.”
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http://tantaluminvestingnews.com/1087/market-tends-for-tantalum-2010/
http://tantaluminvestingnews.com/730/gippsland-ltd-worlds-largest-tantalum-mine/print
BeantwoordenVerwijderenTop Bullboards post: “Yes the property looks promising although the property was bought as a lithium play, the tantulum and rubidium may very well surpass the lithium. These two precious metals are byproducts of refining the lithium. Current prices of tantulum is approx 25.00 us per gram with predictions of doubling in early 2011 as demand surpasses supply. Rubidium is approx 45.00 us per gram. Again demand surpasses supply. China controls 97 per cent of reer and have reported that they would limit exports as there is short supply. Sony had an article in the Toronto Star last week that they may make a formal complaint to the world trade organization against this restraint. If you look at the grab samples,3000 grams per ton of tantalum if you look at the management they are the same mickinnons as hemlo gold and quite a few other mines. It’s a no brainer. I can’t see anybody losing money on this one.” From footloose on the Canadian Orebodies (TSX: V.CO, Stock Forum) board.
BeantwoordenVerwijderen-----------------------------------------
commentaar: Als dit stukje van Stockhouse klopt, dan zou de prijs van tantalum USD 25.000 per KG bedragen, met een mogelijke verdubbeling dit jaar.
January 2011 HEEMSKIRK TIN PROJECT UPDATE Gippsland Limited [ASX: ‘GIP’; FRA: ‘GIX’] is pleased to provide the attached copy of today’s Stellar Resources Ltd [ASX: ‘SRZ’] announcement which outlines their rapid progress on the Heemskirk TinProject in Tasmania and provides an outline of activities over the next three months.For further information, please contact:John DunlopDirectorGippsland LimitedT:+61 8 9340 6000E:jsdunlop@bigpond.com
BeantwoordenVerwijderenPage 2
110125 ASX_Stellar_Heemskirk Tin Project Update 25 January 2011 ASX Code: SRZABN 96 108 758 961Level 7 Exchange Tower530 Little Collins StreetMelbourne Victoria 3000AustraliaTelephone +61 3 9909 7618Facsimile +61 3 9909 7621 www.stellarresources.com.ausrzinfo@stellarresources.com.au ASXRelease Heemskirk Tin Project Update Stellar is driving rapid progress on its Heemskirk Tin Project in Tasmania. It is pleasedto provide an outline of current activities over the next three months that will allow itto commence scoping studies in the June quarter. Preparation of a JORC compliant resource estimate is well advancedand following validation of some of the historical data should be readyfor release at the end of February. Preliminary metallurgical test work has shown that the traditional high-sulphide tin processing circuit will work for Heemskirk tinmineralization. Stellar has committed to the next stage of metallurgicaltesting which will focus on the tin float circuit. Tin prices remain strong at US$27,800/tonne with market tightness expected to maintain current or higher price levels throughout 2011
Tin Market Update
BeantwoordenVerwijderenThe LME tin price remained strong over the last three months with an increase to US$27,800/t from$26,400/t in mid October 2010. Indonesian exports (accounting for 30% of the world market) declinedby 9% in December due to weather disrupted production and increased government regulation of artisanal mining. In addition, China - the largest producer of tin in the world, has moved to protect its tin consuming industries by calling for a reduction in exports and an increase in imports. In 2010, Chinabecame a net importer for the first time with imports increasing by 171% to 13,744 tonnes.According to the International Tin Research Institute (ITRI), the tin market was short by 20,000 tonnes of metal in 2010 which resulted in a substantial drawdown of LME stocks and a 60% increase in the LMEprice. Despite ITRI’s prediction of modest demand growth in 2011, little new supply is also expected resulting in another deficit year, a further drawdown of LME stocks and continued strong price.
Introduction
BeantwoordenVerwijderenThe Heemskirk Tin Project is located north of Zeehan on Tasmania’s west coast. The location is ideal for mininggiven that the area is well serviced by power, water, transport, other infrastructure and mining services. Stellar holds a 60% interest in the Heemskirk Tin Project with joint venture partner Gippsland Limited and can increaseits holding to 70% by completing a feasibility study.Drilling by Aberfoyle during the early 1980s identified three tin deposits - Queen Hill, Severn and Montana - all located within 500m of each other. In 2010, Stellar drilled 6 holes into the near surface Queen Hill deposit. Theresults confirmed the high grade nature of mineralisation, showed that the deposit remains open to the northand south and provided fresh samples for metallurgical testing.
31 January 2011
BeantwoordenVerwijderenABU DABBAB ALLUVIAL TIN EXPLORATION
The Directors of Gippsland Limited ("Gippsland" or "the Company") [ASX: GIP, FRA: GIX] announce today that the Company is to conduct a programme of trial mining in relation to an extensive alluvial tin deposit contained within the 20km2 Abu Dabbab Exploitation Licences.
The programme is a prelude to the full‐scale mining which, subject to the results of the trial mining, the Company plans to commence during 2011.
The trial mining programme will involve the mining and on‐site processing of more than 1000 cubic metres of material. The Company has ordered a trailer mounted alluvial separator from South Africa which is expected to be delivered to site late in the current quarter. Crushing and screening facilities are being sourced from within Egypt.
During the early 1970s a joint Egyptian‐Soviet expedition explored and evaluated two placer tin deposits at Abu Dabbab. The placers are known as Wadi Mubarak and Wadi Quaria and are located adjacent to the large Abu Dabbab tin tantalum deposit and must be mined before the proposed Abu Dabbab waste dump sterilises access to them.
The sampling data produced by the Soviets was re‐evaluated and a new resource estimation completed by Gippsland in 2008 identified an Inferred Resource containing 759t of tin metal.
Enigste probleem met Gippsland is dus Offtake Agreement wat ze nu al tijden proberen te sluiten. Zodra deze er door heen is, zal imo ook de financien voor het project binnen worden gehaald en kan men gaan bouwen aan het project.
BeantwoordenVerwijderenHeel erg interessant project, ik ga long instappen. Jij al gekocht Precies?
FD89,
BeantwoordenVerwijderenik heb Gippsland inderdaad gekocht, zo'n mooie verzameling 'zeldzame'metalen moet vroeg of laat de aandacht trekken.
Ik denk dat vooral hun tin snel geld kan opleveren.
HIGH GRADE JORC MINERAL RESOURCE FOR HEEMSKIRK TIN PROJECT
BeantwoordenVerwijderenGippsland Limited [ASX: 'GIP'; FRA: 'GIX'] is pleased to provide the attached copy of Friday's Stellar Resources Ltd [ASX: 'SRZ'] announcement which highlights the release of a JORC Mineral Resource at the Tasmanian Heemskirk Tin Project, in which Gippsland holds a 40% free‐carried interest.
Highlights of the Mineral Resource include:
• JORC Compliant Mineral Resource of 4.4 Mt grading 1.1% tin containing 49,000 tonnes of tin metal for the three deposits identified to date (Queen Hill, Montana and Severn) within the Heemskirk Tin Project.
• Indicated Mineral Resource of 1.6 Mt grading 1.2% tin at Queen Hill.
• All of the tin deposits remain open at depth.
• Drilling has commenced on near-surface targets around the Queen Hill and Montana deposits to potentially upgrade and expand resources.
The Directors are most encouraged by the size and grade of the Mineral Resource estimate especially when combined with the previously reported positive metallurgical results. These two factors demonstrate that Heemskirk is a world class tin deposit with significant upside exploration potential.
Under the terms of the Heemskirk joint venture agreement, Stellar (subject to satisfaction of a number of conditions) has the right to increase its ownership of the Heemskirk Tin Project from 60% to 70%. These conditions include the requirement of Stellar to:
(a) Complete a comprehensive feasibility study recommending that commercial development be undertaken with a view to undertaking mining operations and containing all necessary supporting reports and data including prepared geological and metallurgical, financing and marketing studies ('Studies'); coupled with,
(b) A written commitment based upon the Studies by a corporation, institution or bank acceptable to Gippsland and Stellar to lend not less than one half of all costs to be meet by Gippsland for the commercial development of the project up to the date of commencement of commercial production.
The scoping study referred to by Stellar is the first step in this process.
For further information, please contact:
JSF Dunlop
AMG sluit overeenkomsten voor levering tantalum
BeantwoordenVerwijderen11 maart 2011, 8:57 uur | DJ
AMSTERDAM (Dow Jones)--AMG Advanced Metallurgical Group nv (AMG.AE) heeft met bestaande klanten overeenkomsten gesloten voor de levering van het metaal tantalum tot eind 2012.
De levering begint in het tweede kwartaal van 2011. Het metaal wordt gedelfd in AMG's MIBRA mijn in Brazilie.
AMG evalueert op dit moment stappen om de productiemogelijkheden van de MIBRA mijn te verbeteren.
Door Harm Luttikhedde, Dow Jones Nieuwsdienst: +31-20-5715210;
06 July 2011
BeantwoordenVerwijderenSCOPING STUDY COMPLETED FOR THE HEEMSKIRK TIN PROJECT
Gippsland Limited [ASX: 'GIP'; FRA: 'GIX'] is pleased to provide the attached copy of today's Stellar Resources Ltd [ASX: 'SRZ'] (“Stellar”) announcement which provides details regarding a scoping study completed by Stellar for the Heemskirk Tin Project. According to Stellar, the study demonstrates a high return on investment is achievable and justifies rapidly moving the project into pre-feasibility phase.
Independent mining consultancy Mining One conducted the study and identified the following highlights.
• 21% internal rate of return and 3.5 year payback at a long-term tin price of US$25,000/t (US$22,500/t net of treatment charges) and 1.0A$/US$ exchange rate.
• US$12,780/t cash cost of tin in concentrate positions the project competitively on industry cost curve.
• Cash operating margin of US$9,720/t or 43% on revenue net of smelting and refining charges.
• Life of mine revenue of $673 million (100% basis) net of smelting and refining charges.
• 600,000 tpa throughput for 7.6 years provides economies of scale.
• 3,900 tonnes of annual tin production would rank the project second to Renison Bell in Australia.
Scoping of project environmental parameters is now underway and should benefit from the fact that all planned operations are within a zone of historical mining.
Stellar, as operator of the JV, have stated that the Heemskirk Tin Project remains on track for production in
2014 subject to the timing of government approvals and financing.
Gippsland is extremely encouraged by the results of the scoping study. It recognizes that, at this early stage of the project, the Montana and Severn deposits, which make up 63% of the current production schedule, are still in the Inferred Resource category. Offsetting this, Stellar has indicated that it plans to infill drill these resources over the next twelve months, so a resource upgrade may be expected. The Company looks
forward to further news as Stellar continues to progress the project to development.