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Norge Mining announced on Wednesday it has been awarded mineral extraction rights covering part of its exploration licences in southwest Norway, where it is developing Europe’s next source of critical minerals.
The awarded rights cover an area of 26.3 km2 in Eigersund municipality, comprising some 32 individual licences including Storeknuten, Skeipstad and Øygrei. Storeknuten, also known as the Eigersund project, is the company’s most advanced exploration area.
According to the Anglo-Norwegian explorer, the award of extraction rights relates to vanadium, titanium and iron ore, all of which are hosted by the norite rock characteristic of the Eigersund area.
Extraction rights for phosphate, another of the company’s target minerals, will be agreed separately with landowners in line with the Norwegian Minerals Act (2009), it said.
A technical report by SRK calculated a JORC-compliant resource (indicated and inferred) totalling 3.4 billion tonnes in the three areas to support at least 30 years of mining.
The main Storeknuten area alone has nearly 1 billion indicated tonnes grading 1.73% P2O5, 4.83% TiO2, 0.07% V2O5 and 3.41% Fe3O4, the SRK report showed.
John Vergopoulos, CEO of Norge Mining, said the award of extraction rights “marks another important step” for the company and its Norwegian subsidiary, Norge Mineraler, in the journey towards a sustainable source of critical raw materials.
“The award of extraction rights underlines the economic viability of our deposits, and we are now focused on preparing the planning and zoning stage prior to the submission of a final planning application,” Vergopoulos said in a statement.
Norge Mineraler’s application for extraction rights represents one of the first projects to go through the Norwegian government’s “fast-track” process, which is designed to advance the permitting of mining operations in the Nordic nation.
