Berkeley Resources has reached a 'major milestone' after being granted an environmental licence for the Retortillo deposit by the regional government of Castilla and León.The Retortillo deposit forms part of the company's flagship Salamanca Project in Spain, where production is scheduled to commence soon.The company has completed substantial work over the last 24 months directed towards permitting of the project, culminating in the submission of its Environmental and Social Impact Assessment (ESIA).The environmental licence covers all mining and processing activities, including treatment of loaded resin transported to Retortillo from other deposits.As the group explained, with the grant of the environmental licence and the favourable recommendation report recently submitted by the Nuclear Safety Council to the regional government, approval of the company's exploitation and reclamation and closure plans is now the only outstanding prerequisite for the granting of the mining licence for Retortillo. The group continued: "The directors are extremely encouraged by the grant of the environmental licence, which highlights the positive progress being made with the permitting process for the Project. This milestone follows the recent successful completion of the project pre-feasibility study, which focused on the integrated development of the Retortillo and Alameda deposits. "The study results clearly demonstrated the project's potential to support a significant scale, long life, low cost uranium operation." NR