Mineral exploration and development company Frontier Rare Earths released the results of the prefeasibility study (PFS) for its Zandkopsdrift rare earths project earlier this month, which indicated that the proposed development of the project to produce a range of high-purity, separated rare earths is both technically feasible and economically robust.

Additionally, the production of a saleable manganese sulphate by-product has been proven both technically and economically feasible and has been incorporated into the process flow sheet and economic analysis for the PFS.

The 60 000 ha Zandkopsdrift project is located in the Namaqualand region of the Northern Cape.

“We are pleased to have completed a positive PFS on Zandkopsdrift, which confirms the significant economic potential of the project and the opportunity for Frontier to become a major new producer of high-purity, separated rare earths and manganese sulphate,” says Frontier president and CEO James Kenny in a press statement.

The PFS was conducted by a group of independent specialist consultants retained by Frontier to examine the technical, logistical, legal, environmental and economic aspects of the project.

The specialist studies have been independently reviewed by Venmyn Deloitte, a wholly owned subsidiary of Deloitte specialising in the technical and economic evaluation of mineral projects.

Venmyn Deloitte has concluded that the PFS has been conducted well within industry and National Instrument 43-101 reporting standards, and it comprehensively examines at a PFS level of accuracy all the significant components of the Zandkopsdrift project.

As the selected mining, processing and infrastructure design components of the Zandkopsdrift PFS have been conducted at about 20% to about 25% accuracy,

Venmyn considers the PFS of sufficient accuracy and that it has a satisfactory confidence level for potential investors to make reasonable decisions based on the outcomes of the study.

Venmyn considers the costs and price estimates conservative and the Zandkopsdrift project economically robust; thus, the overall study can be considered to be an advanced PFS.

The bulk of the engineering design work and capital and operating cost estimates for the PFS was prepared by a team of international engineering companies, including WorleyParsons, Veolia Water Technologies South Africa and Outotec.

Based on the development plan for Zandkopsdrift as outlined in the PFS, Frontier believes that it is well positioned to become one of the next new major producers of high-purity, separated rare-earth oxides outside China, with a target total production capacity of 16 000 t/y, as well as one of the largest integrated producers of high-demand, critical rare-earth oxides in separated form outside China.