Apr 7 2015
Texas Rare Earth Resources Corp., an exploration company targeting the heavy rare earths, is pleased to announce that it has entered into a uranium offtake agreement with a subsidiary of AREVA, the world's largest nuclear and renewables energy company, headquartered in France.
According to the agreement, TRER will supply up to 300,000 pounds of natural uranium concentrates (U308) per year based upon a pricing formula indexed to U308 spot prices at the times of delivery. The Agreement is for a term of five years commencing in 2018 or as soon thereafter, contingent upon development and production at its Round Top project. Other terms and conditions of the Agreement reflect industry standards. According to Ux Consulting, a leading uranium industry data provider, the closing spot price of U308 on March 30, 2015 was $39.50 per pound.
Dan Gorski, President and CEO of TRER commented: "This offtake agreement with AREVA demonstrates industry confidence in the potential commercial viability of the development of our Round Top heavy rare earth project and the marketability of our byproducts. We intend to continue to monetize our remaining byproducts such as lithium, potassium and beryllium as we move forward in commercializing our entire resource base."
As reported in the 2013 Preliminary Economic Assessment (PEA), TRER has approximately 96.4 million pounds in total of measured, indicated and inferred U308 oxide resources, out of which 56.3 million pounds are measured and indicated resources.
The state of Texas is the second largest producer of uranium in the United States. The Texas Railroad Commission reports ten uranium exploration permits issued in the state as of January 2015. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, as of the 4th quarter of 2014, Texas has an annual production capacity of 7.3 million pounds of uranium as represented by seven existing projects.
Jack Lifton, TRER board member and rare earth industry consultant noted: "This is, to the best of my knowledge, the first binding offtake contract for a valuable byproduct of a heavy rare earth project. We were able to attract a uranium industry market leader like AREVA because of the progress on our Round Top project metallurgy due to our application of the K-Tech continuous ion exchange/continuous ion chromatography (CIX/CIC) technology. This separation technology has been applied to the recovery of uranium from similar process leach solutions and is commonly used in the uranium extraction industry. This is a major step forward for Texas Rare Earth Resources."
Source: http://www.trer.com/