Alex Mezei retained as Chief Metallurgist to
supervise test work and process engineering
Fortune Minerals Limited (TSX: FT) (OTCQB: FTMDF)
(“Fortune” or the “Company”)
(www.fortuneminerals.com) is pleased to announce that it has
entered into a new option agreement with JFSL Field Services ULC
(“JFSL”) to purchase the brownfield industrial site in
Lamont County, Alberta where it plans to construct its
hydrometallurgical refinery (“Alberta Refinery”). The
Alberta Refinery would process metal concentrates from Fortune’s
planned NICO cobalt-gold-bismuth-copper mine and concentrator in
the Northwest Territories (“NWT”) (collectively, the
“NICO Project”) and provide a reliable domestic supply of
Critical Minerals for the energy transition and other new
technologies. The Alberta Refinery will produce cobalt sulphate for
the North American lithium-ion battery industry, bismuth ingots
(12% of global reserves) and copper cement - with more than one
million ounces of in-situ gold as a countercyclical and highly
liquid co-product. Fortune also has a process collaboration with
Rio Tinto examining the feasibility of processing materials
produced from Kennecott Smelter wastes in Utah at the Alberta
Refinery to increase cobalt and bismuth production.
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Pursuant to the new option agreement, Fortune can acquire the
Lamont County site from JFSL for C$6,000,000 prior to the end of
November 2025, provided it makes monthly option payments of
C$100,000. The monthly option payments and the C$1,437,500
previously paid by Fortune to JFSL, are deductible from the
purchase price. JFSL will be entitled to list the Lamont County
property for sale during the option period, subject to Fortune’s
90-day right of first refusal to match any third-party offer. JFSL
will also be entitled to continue using the Lamont County property
and facilities for the eighteen months following a sale to
Fortune.
JFSL is a subsidiary of Worley Group (“Worley”), an
international engineering, construction management and
environmental services company listed for trading on the Australian
Stock Exchange. Worley will be the preferred contractor for
environmental, engineering, procurement, fabrication and
construction work for the Alberta Refinery.
The JFSL site is comprised of 76.78 acres of lands adjacent to
the Canadian National Railway in Alberta’s Industrial Heartland, an
association of five municipalities northeast of Edmonton with
planning approvals and tax incentives designed to attract heavy
industry. The JFSL site is a former steel fabrication plant with
more than 42,000 square feet of serviced shops and buildings
situated near the services, sources of reagents, and commutable
skilled worker pool already in place for the Alberta petrochemicals
industry. These are expected to materially reduce capital and
operating costs for the Alberta Refinery during construction and
operations.
Fortune is also pleased to announce that Alex Mezei, M.Sc.
P.Eng., has joined the Company as Chief Metallurgist. Mr Mezei will
supervise the test work and process and design engineering for the
NICO Project, which the Company is advancing with the recently
announced government contribution funding totalling approximately
C$17 million (see news releases dated May 16, 2024 and December 5,
2023). Mr. Mezei is a Chemical Engineer with a more than forty
years of diverse experience in international process engineering,
test and pilot work, and economic assessments for a broad range of
commodities around the world. This includes 22 years at SGS Mineral
Services (“SGS”) in Lakefield, Ontario where he was
Director, Engineering Technology Services, Metallurgical
Operations, and Senior Metallurgist and notably, where he
supervised the hydrometallurgical work for the NICO Project. Prior
to SGS, Alex worked for Asea Brown Boveri as an instrumentation
engineer, as a process research scientist at the Institute for
Technological Engineering for Inorganic Chemistry and Nonferrous
Metals in Romania, and as a production engineer at the Phoenix
Metallurgical-Chemical Plant in Baia-Mare, Romania. Since retiring
from SGS in 2016, Alex has worked as an Independent Consulting
Metallurgist and Director of Metallurgy for Planetary
Technologies.
For more detailed information about the NICO Mineral Reserves
and certain technical information in this news release, please
refer to the Technical Report on the NICO Project, entitled
"Technical Report on the Feasibility Study for the
NICO-Gold-Cobalt-Bismuth-Copper Project, Northwest Territories,
Canada", dated April 2, 2014 and prepared by Micon International
Limited which has been filed on SEDAR and is available under the
Company's profile at www.sedar.com.
The disclosure of scientific and technical information contained
in this news release has been approved by Robin Goad, M.Sc.,
P.Geo., President and Chief Executive Officer of Fortune, who is a
"Qualified Person" under National Instrument 43-101.
About Fortune Minerals:
Fortune is a Canadian mining company focused on developing the
NICO Cobalt-Gold-Bismuth-Copper Project in the NWT and Alberta.
Fortune also owns the satellite Sue-Dianne Copper-Silver-Gold
Deposit located 25 km north of the NICO Deposit and is a potential
future source of incremental mill feed to extend the life of the
NICO mill and concentrator.
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This press release contains forward-looking information and
forward-looking statements within the meaning of applicable
securities legislation. This forward-looking information includes
statements with respect to, among other things, the exercise of the
option by the Company and the purchase of the JFSL site, the
construction of the proposed hydrometallurgical refinery at the
JFSL site, the potential for expansion of the NICO Deposit and the
Company’s plans to develop the NICO Project. Forward-looking
information is based on the opinions and estimates of management as
well as certain assumptions at the date the information is given
(including, in respect of the forward-looking information contained
in this press release, assumptions regarding: the successful
completion of the Company’s due diligence investigations on the
JFSL site, the Company’s ability to secure the necessary financing
to fund the exercise of the option and complete the purchase of the
JFSL site, the Company’s ability to complete construction of a NICO
Project refinery; the Company’s ability to arrange the necessary
financing to continue operations and develop the NICO Project; the
receipt of all necessary regulatory approvals for the construction
and operation of the NICO Project and the related
hydrometallurgical refinery and the timing thereof; growth in the
demand for cobalt; the time required to construct the NICO Project;
and the economic environment in which the Company will operate in
the future, including the price of gold, cobalt and other
by-product metals, anticipated costs and the volumes of metals to
be produced at the NICO Project). However, such forward-looking
information is subject to a variety of risks and uncertainties and
other factors that could cause actual events or results to differ
materially from those projected in the forward-looking information.
These factors include the risks that the 2021 drill program may not
result in a meaningful expansion of the NICO Deposit, the Company
may not be able to complete the purchase of the JFSL site and
secure a site for the construction of a refinery, the Company may
not be able to finance and develop NICO on favourable terms or at
all, uncertainties with respect to the receipt or timing of
required permits, approvals and agreements for the development of
the NICO Project, including the related hydrometallurgical
refinery, the construction of the NICO Project may take longer than
anticipated, the Company may not be able to secure offtake
agreements for the metals to be produced at the NICO Project, the
Sue-Dianne Property may not be developed to the point where it can
provide mill feed to the NICO Project, the inherent risks involved
in the exploration and development of mineral properties and in the
mining industry in general, the market for products that use cobalt
or bismuth may not grow to the extent anticipated, the future
supply of cobalt and bismuth may not be as limited as anticipated,
the risk of decreases in the market prices of cobalt, bismuth and
other metals to be produced by the NICO Project, discrepancies
between actual and estimated Mineral Resources or between actual
and estimated metallurgical recoveries, uncertainties associated
with estimating Mineral Resources and Reserves and the risk that
even if such Mineral Resources prove accurate the risk that such
Mineral Resources may not be converted into Mineral Reserves once
economic conditions are applied, the Company’s production of
cobalt, bismuth and other metals may be less than anticipated and
other operational and development risks, market risks and
regulatory risks. Readers are cautioned to not place undue reliance
on forward-looking information because it is possible that
predictions, forecasts, projections and other forms of
forward-looking information will not be achieved by the Company.
The forward-looking information contained herein is made as of the
date hereof and the Company assumes no responsibility to update or
revise it to reflect new events or circumstances, except as
required by law.
View source
version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20240819194865/en/
For further information please contact: Fortune Minerals
Limited Troy Nazarewicz Investor Relations Manager
info@fortuneminerals.com Tel: (519) 858-8188
www.fortuneminerals.com
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