West Cobar Metals has achieved another breakthrough in its proposed development of the large Salazar critical minerals project in Western Australia with the return of significant scandium resources at the site, located near the southern WA port town of Esperance.
The maiden mineral resource estimate (MRE) for the Newmont deposit at Salazar identified 12 million tonnes at 103 parts per million scandium, while early stage metallurgical test work confirmed high scandium leach recovery up to 81.2% at atmospheric pressure.
The unveiling of a large scandium body and the promising metallurgical test work has boosted market confidence that West Cobar has a significant rare earth endowment at Salazar.
Additional product
“We are excited to report a maiden MRE for scandium as an additional co-product at the Newmont deposit in addition to rare earth elements, titanium dioxide and alumina,” managing director Matt Szwedzicki said.
“Scandium is a very high-value critical mineral which has the potential to enhance the overall project economics.”
“Furthermore, the addition of scandium to the growing list of critical minerals already reported […] highlights the potential geopolitical significance of Newmont.”
Apart from its basket of high-value minerals, the Newmont deposit benefits from unique mineralogy that is expected to simplify the processing options.
Test work underway
“Historical sighter-level test work demonstrates that excellent leaching recoveries are achievable at atmospheric pressure and could enable competitive extraction costs,” Mr Szwedzicki said.
“Importantly, the unusual mineralogy points to the application of comparatively straightforward processing technologies.”
“Metallurgical and beneficiation test work is currently moving ahead rapidly to develop a viable multi-product extraction pathway.”
While a number of Australian scandium deposits are hosted in lateritic host rocks, Salazar’s is hosted in lower iron content saprolitic clays, potentially making the scandium easier and cheaper to recover.
Current metallurgical works are enabling the company to focus development studies on a project that would have a titanium product (ilmenite concentrate) and rare earth element stream, with scandium as a co-product.
Lightly-produced metal
There are very few global sources of scandium.
In what may be perceived as an indication of the growing strategic interest in the metal, Rio Tinto recently purchased the Owendale scandium deposit in NSW and established a dedicated scandium business unit.
Sitting at a current price of around $1,310 per kilogram, scandium is a lightweight metal used in alloys and solid oxide fuel cells, the aerospace and defence industry, lighting, electronics, ceramics and 3D printing, among other uses.
