Yeelirrie
http://www.cameco.com/australia
uranium,
Phone:
Address:
24 Hasler Road, Osborne Park, WA, 6017
State: 24 Hasler Road, Osborne Park, WA, 6017
Email:
The Yeelirrie uranium deposit located 420 kilometres north of Kalgoorlie,110 kilometres north west of Leinster and 70 kilometres south west of Wiluna, in the Northern Goldfields Region of Western Australia, isone of the largest underdeveloped uranuim deposits in Australia.
Yeelirrie Uranium Deposit Discovered by WMC in 1972
The Yeelirrie uranium deposit was discovered by Western Mining Corporation (WMC) in 1972 , which, since that time has been substantiallyexplored by WMC and in later years by BHP Billiton. It is considered to bea world class uranium deposit that current owner Cameco Australia, a fullyowned subsidiary of Canadian based uranium miner Cameco, is developing at a pace in line with world market conditions. Cameco acquired the Yeelirrie uranium project from BHP Billiton in 2012. The Yeelirrie uranium deposit is situated close to the surface which makes it suitable for mining as an open cut mining operation.Yeelirrie Uranium Project Acquired by Cameco in 2012
Following the Yeelirrie discovery in 1972 by WMC, the company, in 1982,advanced the project through an exploration program, the obtaining of environmental approvals, the carrying out of test mining activities, the building and operation of a pilot processing plant, early engineering works and the completion of a full feasibility study, but it was placed on care and maintenance two years later, in 1984. In 2005 the Yeelirrie Project was acquired by BHP Billiton, which, in 2008, revitalised the project with the completion of an extensive drilling program, a scoping study, pre-feasibility studies and the preparation of a draft environmental scoping report. However, in 2011 BHP Billiton placed the whole project on hold until it sold it to Cameco in 2012. Cameco began its own environmental approval process in the last quarter of 2014 and is presently positioning itself to respond positively to any change in world demand for uranium.Yeelirrie Calcrete Ore Body was Worlds Largest at Time of Discovery
The Yeelirrie uranium deposit is continuous over a distance of nine kilometres, it is, on average, around seven metres thick and lies below an overburden cover of the same thickness. It is up to 1.5 kilometres wide in places. The mineral content of the Yeelirrie uranium project, that was prepared for BHP Billiton in July 2012, shows the deposit hosting a measured and indicated mineral resource of around 63,000 tonnes containing a uranium grade of around 0.13 percent. At the time of its discovery in 1972, it was the first large calcrete ore body discovered anywhere in the world, a fact that made it difficult in determining the exact size of the deposit. In order to accurately determine the size of the ore body, trial mining was undertaken that involved opening of several pits that mined over 130,000 tonnes of ore. This ore was processed at a pilot processing plant at Kalgoorlie. Tailings were taken back to the mine site where they were dumped in the pits and in several dams.
In early 2015 the EPA (Environmental Protection Authority) is once again assessing plans to open an uranium mine at Yeelirrie, this time on behald of Cameco. A similar study was submitted by BHP Billiton in 2010.
