London South East prides itself on its community spirit, and in order to keep the chat section problem free, we ask all members to follow these simple rules. In these rules, we refer to ourselves as "we", "us", "our". The user of the website is referred to as "you" and "your".
By posting on our share chat boards you are agreeing to the following:
The IP address of all posts is recorded to aid in enforcing these conditions. As a user you agree to any information you have entered being stored in a database. You agree that we have the right to remove, edit, move or close any topic or board at any time should we see fit. You agree that we have the right to remove any post without notice. You agree that we have the right to suspend your account without notice.
Please note some users may not behave properly and may post content that is misleading, untrue or offensive.
It is not possible for us to fully monitor all content all of the time but where we have actually received notice of any content that is potentially misleading, untrue, offensive, unlawful, infringes third party rights or is potentially in breach of these terms and conditions, then we will review such content, decide whether to remove it from this website and act accordingly.
Premium Members are members that have a premium subscription with London South East. You can subscribe here.
London South East does not endorse such members, and posts should not be construed as advice and represent the opinions of the authors, not those of London South East Ltd, or its affiliates.
If HMG steps in and classifies Mining+ smelting as energy intensive industry then a lower cost of energy could be delivered.
It sounds to me as if this is under consideration.
As to volumes, if some tonnage from Africa and the Iberian peninsula are added to the possible production in Cornwall it begins to stack up.
Perhaps other helpful factors are that it is now very expensive to send containers to China and that a resilient supply chain is sought. China is struggling to find enough power to smelt at present, though I doubt whether that situation will last long.
Fira2011
They have 2 offtake agreements for Tungsten, 1 for tin and 1 for the aggregate.
Global Tungsten Powders and Wolfram Bergbeau und Hutten, for a total 2300tpa WO3, 100% of the tin produced with Vanomet (Afrimet) and GRS roadstone for aggregate:-
Off shore wind is something being investigated, with a proposal to connect a trial onto the wave hub. The challenge for offshore wind here is the depth of water. Conventional offshore turbines are piled into the seabed, but the depth of water off of Cornwall is too deep for that to be feasible, so the plan is to create floating turbines, but if you imagine the forces being created by even a relatively small 2Mw turbine, they are enormous, so stopping the things moving is a challenge.
On the smelter front, a company investing in building a smelter in the UK would be taking a massive risk, as if the local mines failed, their own business would fail shortly behind.
I would point out Quebec, Iceland, Norway, and several other places have Aluminium smelters based mainly on Hydro power. But Hydro power has a number of major advantages over wind/solar, namely much reduced intermittancy, and scale. There are no significant Hydropower resources in the UK.
I would also point out as an aside, China produces 56% of the world's aluminium, and 57% of its steel production.
To bring this back to CUSN, I do not have the stats to hand for tin (smelted) production, but I would not be surprised if China had a similar proportion of *smelted* tin metal production, because all the tin concentrate from Myanmar is going there, as well as a some from a few other places. It'd surprise me if it was less than half of global production. For tungsten, China's share of global production is over 80% now, and they are exporting much less concentrate than a few years ago, preferring to add value and make more finished products. I might continue that train of thought at LSE:TUN some time. CUSN's newly listed neighbours over the Tamar, planning to start production of tungsten and tin next year!
Argh but connect to wind power grid off Cornwall what would you get ,they seem to be install in thousands of wind turbines around our coasts atm
"Other countries have the same net zero target and the solution for them is probably nuclear in northern climes. Polands copper manufacturer has ordered multiple small nuclear plants from the US"
Small Modular Reactors are potentially a major part of the energy mix of the future, essentially they are one of the few non-fossil fuel based technologies with the potential to provide reliable baseload power, and given construction costs of nuclear are such a high % of the overall cost of electricity from them, if that can be substantively reduced, nuclear would become much more favourable. Nonetheless, it would be a bold move by KGHM (copper, Poland) to invest in this technology, although I'd point out at this point it is only a Memorandum of Understanding to explore the potential use of this technology, so any financial commitment will be minimal at this stage. But the fact they are even going to the trouble to look at it, shows that they are highly concerned with the plans being put in place, and understand that existing renewable technologies, even combined with batteries, will not be adequate for their needs.
https://newsroom.nuscalepower.com/press-releases/news-details/2021/NuScale-Power-Signs-Memorandum-of-Understanding-with-KGHM-and-PBE-to-Explore-SMR-Deployment-in-Poland/default.aspx
"Solar powered smelters have been built."
Actually, no, they haven't, and there's many very good reasons smelter powered off solar energy alone is not viable. The project you refer to is no doubt this;
https://www.nsenergybusiness.com/news/uae-solar-aluminium/
If you read the *details* - and details are crucial, what you will find is they are providing solar energy of 560,000 MWh to the Plant, to make 40,000 tonnes of aluminium - with potential to expand. Given the company make 2,300,000 tonnes of aluminum, this means your "solar powered" aluminium, is in fact 1.7% solar powered. 40/2300 = 1.7%
So, yeah, its really a lot of window dressing at this stage. A lot of companies are starting to buy only "renewable electricity" - 100% certified Green, and claiming that their products embedded CO2 is thus very low, but the reality is there is a lot of creative accounting involved. I am sure there will be places in the world where you can use much higher % of renewable energy in major industrial processes cost effectively, but you always need backup thermal power, or very capital intensive energy storage solutions.
And before you start up on "batteries" - the largest battery energy storage facility in the World, Moss Landing Energy Storage Facility (1600MWh), in California, would power EGA's aluminium smelters, for less than 30 minutes. Largest battery in the world, wouldn't even get them through half an hour of the night... and if the power stops in a smelter for more than a couple of hours, and the metal solidifies, the whole line is a write-off, incoming bill for hundreds of millions of $ to fix.
Solar powered smelter in Cornwall? Hmm, I dont
Dumpunter great idea! !,
Frankly I think a UK-based smelter is a pipe dream. These smelters are designed for 50-150kt/annum of tin concentrate feed, which is far beyond what South Crofty + any other operations are likely to produce (realistically around 10kt/year). So there'd be significant imports of concentrate from abroad, which then begs the question, why not just site the smelter somewhere abroad where energy is cheaper. I think you'll find UK demand for tin is negligible in global terms, as we dont actually manufacture much electronics here.
The environmental and planning permissions would be a nightmare to obtain to build such a smelter anywhere in the UK, no matter how isolated the site. Nimbyism. And then the main economic issue is that such an operation is at direct odds with the ever increasing energy costs in the UK. If you actually read the "Net Zero Strategy: Build Back Greener" report - which I have, you will see it involves a huge reduction in overall energy consumption in the UK. The sources of energy they will use are intrinsically extremely high cost. No one is going to locate a new energy intensive industry here.
If you read point.9 on p122 of the Report, that is the only place in the entire report where Carbon border tariffs are discussed, and well, it makes very clear HMG have zero resolve to pursue this policy. And if they don't, the reality is that the effect of the entire "Green" agenda is simply to offshore the remaining heavy industries that are high energy users. No one is going to invest in energy intensive industries in the UK, they will relocate or build new chemical factories, smelters, etc - elsewhere. And import into the UK. That has been the trend in recent decades. This plan will accelerate that trend.
I'm sorry to be a downer on this, I'm a huge proponent of Cornish mining, and very bullish about the future of metal mining in the UK, in my opinion its a matter of when not if at this point. However I'm also a realist. The Green plan isn't going to lead to an industrial revival in the UK, rather its going to obliterate what little industry we have left. If it can be moved abroad, it will be. Nonetheless, we may be able to produce some metal concentrates, from specific deposits that are economically viable at current and likely future metal prices (see South Crofty, Hemerdon, Redmoor & Parys Mtn), and that will spur on further exploration which will hopefully delineate more such resources. Underground mining is not very energy intensive, energy is a significant input cost, but its lower as a % of total costs, compared to a lot other industrial activities. So its something we can do profitably, even if we are handicapped by "saving the world". And if the GBP falls due to the incompetence of our wider strategy, that only makes mining here more attractive.
Vii sounds good
Thanks CK. Follow up produced this report. 20 years old but gives an idea of the cost of set up. Interesting to see it was signed off by a Mark Thompson.............................
https://geoscience.nt.gov.au/gemis/ntgsjspui/bitstream/1/82865/6/CR20020078_06_Ausmelt~Prefeasibility~Study~Report.pdf
Probably Ausmelt
Bubble
Smelter near the mines, and battery factory near the car plants, is my guess.
Anyone know a link to smelter designs?
Vii- many thanks for your excellent reporting
The head of automotive investments for BEIS (was DTI) spoke at the conference and two of his colleagues will be at the conference with him tomorrow. HMG seems to have got the message as to how important the success of Cornish Mining is to the UK economy, which is positive news for all the companies presenting. CUSN, SML, CT ltd, CL, BLL, TW today alone. Quite a few London brokers present as well so word is spreading.
It is very important for the UK not to miss this boat. i.e. getting the whole chain of vertical integration from mine to car manufacturing. Without the lithium mining/extraction it is going to be difficult for us to keep the car industry and the 800,000 jobs that depend on it. So we need to fill in with lithium processing cell making and battery manufacture. Batteries with Lithium cathodes do not travel well so car manufacturing may migrate to where the lithium is processed and turned into batteries. The UK need that to be here.
Up 5:45% on tsx 29c
Excellent info vii boom time coming to Cornwall imho ,need two giga factories and a smelter refinery now to add to the demand of tin /copper/lithium, has to be viable now with government funding and institutional funding ,once in a lifetime opportunity to to be part of this boom time just like the oil boom time we had many years ago
Valuation it is.
Thank you for the run down. Did u attend in person or online?
And I forgot Cornish Resources Ltd - wholly owned by SML.
Sally Norcross -Webb also made a good case for investing in Cornish Tin ltd ( Wheal Vor)
A very positive outlook was described for Cornwall, with tin, Lithium Copper etc prices heading strongly upwards with the medium term outlook being such that global supply will be running out of key metals in a few years time. With little new supply to come on stream, what metal there is, looks likely to have to be rationed by price. For tin where a lot of the demand is from the manufacture of billions of electrical devices, the cost of tin is a tiny part of the total item, so demand will not be reduced until very high prices are met. So the outlook for CUSN, is excellent. Furthermore, South Crofty is one of the few new sources of tin supply that can be brought on stream relatively quickly - perhaps in four years time because of the existing infrastructure - shafts/decline etc and permits being in place. Elsewhere new tin mines will probably take 8-10 years, so CUSN through SC is in a very good position.
Very positive presentations too from Cornish Lithium, British Lithium and Tungsten West.