Magnesium

​Driftwood Creek Project is comprised of high grade magnesite which when smelted or calcined can produce three distinct products.  These are magnesium metal, caustic calcined magnesia (CCM), and dead burned magnesia (DBM).  A comparative economic and technology study by Hatch Consulting (Canada) in 2018 determined magnesium metal produced from Driftwood Creek may be profitable with a global minimum price cutoff of $4,000 USD per tonne, access to the US market and pricing remains a key criteria to profitability. The current price environment (2022) now supports the advancement of the magnesium metal production scenario, which is now the focus of the project.  This report remains confidential. 

 

Highlights of the project and Preliminary Economic Assessment for the production of DBM are as follows:

• 164 kilometers north of Cranbrook, B.C.

• Production Profile: PEA outlines 19-year mine life, 3.5 year payback and C$529.8 million pre-tax NPV

• Mining and Milling: Potentially amenable to open-pit mining and established beneficiation methods

• Excellent Infrastructure: Access to rails, road, labor and electricity

• Exploration Potential: Mineralization traced over 2,000 meters; remains open along strike and at depth

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Preliminary Economic Assessment*

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• Pre-tax NPV @ 5% of $529.8 million, IRR of 24.5% with a 3.5-year payback

• Post-tax NPV @ 5% of $316.7million, IRR of 19.3% with a 4.0-year payback

• Initial capital costs of $235.9 million (Total life-of mine (“LOM”) – $239.8 includes sustaining/closure costs of $3.9 million and contingency costs of $40.0 million)

• Conventional quarry pit mine with a 1200 tonne per day (“tpd”) process plant using conventional crushing, grinding, flotation upgrading, calcination, and sintering to produce a saleable DBM product

• Cash costs of $350/tonne MgO

• All-in sustaining costs (“AISC”) of $351/tonne MgO

• Average annual MgO production of 169,700 tonnes during an 19 year mine life

• LOM average head grades of 43.27% MgO

• LOM MgO recoveries of 90%

• LOM strip ratio of 2.4 to 1 of rock to mineralized material

*The reader is advised that the preliminary economic assessment summarized in this is only intended to provide an initial, high-level review of the project. The PEA mine plan and economic model include the use of inferred mineral resources which are considered too speculative geologically to have the economic considerations applied to them that would enable them to be categorized as mineral reserves and there is no certainty that the preliminary economic assessment will be realized.