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Remember, the proposition at time of acquisition was $2m per year accrual to HE1 from helium in the first five years, and maybe $1m from CO2, but the reality could now be 50% higher than that and rising with more wells.

There's a few variables but once the plant is up to speed with the seventh well tied in and the CO2 processing going latter part of the year then it starts to look very healthy. For example, if they were able to sell 1200 mscf helium a month at $500 and 40,000 mscf CO2 at $400 a ton then they could be grossing $17m a year and clearing $10m split between the two partners. With the right infill wells the helium could rise closer to plant capacity. For example, at 2,000 mscf the margin is getting closer to $15m. If the low grade helium price rose to $750 then potentially more than $20m. Initially, until the CO2 comes on stream it depends on spot price trailer sales. If the current demand price is as mad as some people say then $750k a month to HE1 isn't out of the question.

2,200 Mscf/month is the manufacturer’s ‘maximum’ helium processing capacity for the plant running 24/7. It’s not the initial production or planning scenario. You need to look at the actual helium output of the six wells tied in so far, with a bit of headroom for efficiency and downtime. That would be approximately half of the max capacity or a bit more, maybe 1,000 to 1,500 Mscf-month?

Idle lunch break, so here's some idle speculation about base line commercial scenarios. Let's assume you need somewhere in the region of 250+ mscf helium a month to tempt a starter level Tier 1 off taker agreement with a major like Linde (maybe 1.5 tube trailers a month) and aim for 300 mscf as a buffer on meeting that obligation. If you could pump the wells to 12,400 bbl/d fluid (upper limit of the CPR cautious case), while maintaining the P50 case of 5.2% helium concentration (already proven), then you'd need to tap the following gas water ratios from carefully isolated zones to supply your modular processing plant (the feasibility study proposal was to start off with a 5 well 'Early Production System').

3 wells at 0.77 GWR

4 wells at 0.58 GWR

5 wells at 0.46 GWR

I think that might be a more reasonable benchmark to aim for in demonstrating a commercial pilot project. The return on investment might be marginal initially (after royalties, clearing fees, levy, government free carry), but capex could be offset against tax in early years. I'm not sure they'd tempt a Tier 1 offtaker with that kind of early stage, so maybe Tier 2/regional offtakers/distributors initially (e.g. Afrox or even direct helium users in Tanzania worried about import dependency). But it would prove up the model and if by luck they hit an even higher payload zone then that would be a bonus. If they could tap anything like 0.8 GWR then it starts to look more tempting to a major. Just speculation.

Exactly, and the company chose to use the P10 case in their comms, which is slightly cheeky but not uncommon.

With respect, that's a pretty rampy pitch if you're banking on maximum flow rates and maximum concentration readings for development planning (which is basically what the company did in their internal modelling for RNS and feasibility study, slightly cheeky but not uncommon). Important to be realistic. They have proved the helium is there. They haven't yet proved it can be extracted profitably at commercial scale, but there are some promising indicators.

They've proved it has commercial potential. In particular the EWT test back in 2024 showed they could tap into a low volume natural flow with a gas water ratio of more than 1.0. That's exceptional if it could be replicated at higher volumes with artificial lift. When they pumped the well in the ESP test the GWR collapsed. This appeared to be because of dilution / lack of isolation from the intermediate aquifers. That might be due to the engineering failure of packers in the well or it might be due to the pressure drop at source sucking water back in from all directions. They need to hit the high GWR sweet zone with a hole that doesn't leak to test that theory. They proven they can maintain the helium concentration so there's a sliding scale of possibilities between the other two variables, which they might already know something about. For example, could they pump less fluid, say 5,000 - 10,000 bbl/d, and preserve the high GWR? Purely hypothetical but if they could pump 7,500 bbl/d from 5 wells at 0.8 GWR and 5.4% then it would take a couple of weeks to fill one tube trailer. Opex pumping costs significantly lower at that volume. Modular processing plant paid for in maybe 3-4 years net margin, much quicker at inflated helium prices. Tier 1 offtake agreement etc

I'm not talking it down Stan, Rukwa has the 'potential' to be both of long term strategic importance and to disrupt global helium industry norms, if it can be commercially proven. That's the point. They need proven reserves. At the moment it isn't proven and HE1 lack to resources to progress further with the appraisal programme on their own, which is why they're now looking for a partner to help with that. The current regional helium supply shortage makes that kind of risk venture a more tempting proposition. If they can prove that helium can be commercially processed from water alone, with or without a revenue byproduct like geothermal energy, then that's a game changer for the global helium industry's dependency on natural gas wells. If...

Were we expecting the main Fundraise subscriber shares to be listed today?

583,333,334 new Ordinary Shares - "It is expected that Admission will take place at 8.00 a.m. (London time) on or around 31 March 2026 (or such later date as may be agreed between the Company and the subscribers)."

Agreed, I imagine they’d be looking for something like the farm in they did the other way round for BNL, a partner to share capital risk for shared ownership at the initial stage, with first refusal or exit option clauses for subsequent stages of development. It’s a slightly earlier stage project than Galactica, less certainty for the partner with higher costs, but they only need one successful well to provide the initial proof of concept.

I don’t think that kind of ‘bidding war’ is very likely. They’ve discovered a significant helium system across a very large licence area and they have a plausible hypothesis about how the helium might be recovered but they haven’t yet proved it can be done commercially. They’re looking for a partner to invest in the risk of that unknown and I think the majors would usually wait for a junior to prove that before showing their hand closer to the development stage. But if global helium supply is going to be significantly constrained for years then maybe a larger player might take a punt on the potential for exclusive offtaker rights. No one knows, but I doubt that ‘an industry partner’ means one of those majors at this stage, although I wouldn’t rule out Chinese interest if Sinopec’s Weihe Basin pilot project has been successful (they’ve kept very quiet about the results).

I added an inflationary increment to BNL’s indicative pre-war mid prices. It’s a base case as we don’t yet know what current demand pricing is for low grade helium in Colorado or whether that’ll be the price later this year. If you think it’ll be $750 for another year then adjust accordingly, maybe net $10m pre tax per partner for the full year July 2026 to June 2027?

BNL gave a breakdown of their revenue and cost assumptions as prospectus for their subscription fund raise in December. Like any company pitching for investors they slightly over-egg the projections but that's normal as long as it's taken into account.

On the income side, the assumptions were based on the plant running at max capacity 24/7 every day of the year, unlikely but illustrative. The first seven wells should flow enough helium for around 60-75% capacity and you'd need to allow a margin for inefficiency, downtime, maintenance etc. So initial helium production might be closer to 1,500mscf/month than the maximum 2,200. Even so, that might gross $9m a year at $500 spot price, more if prices remain seriously inflated (plus new infill wells to come).

When the full CO2 production comes on stream in a few months that could easily match or exceed initial helium revenue.

On the cost side, their opex estimate was mostly fixed costs (leasing, staffing, financing) with a bit of variable cost (taxes, fuel costs). So their $13/mscf assumption at max capacity looks more like a fixed sum than a variable. Maybe $7.25m per year give or take a bit. But they could well net $14m a year pre tax between the two partners by the end of the year, once all the high grade CO2 is on stream, if the low grade helium price also holds up (e.g. 2,000 Mscf/month helium @ $500 plus 40,000 Mscf/month CO2 @ $400/ton ?)

Pre-placing positions were all done by 11am auction on news day. New shares should be admitted tomorrow.

The funds are to speed up early production and development in Colorado, that’s where the immediate money can be made. Rukwa is more for back burner maintenance while they pursue farm out options for further appraisal work there.

“Blue Star’s Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Trent Spry, commented:

“We are very pleased to have received such encouraging support from both new and existing

institutional, high net worth and sophisticated investors. This funding confirms the market's support

for our immediate roadmap. It allows us to focus on two key priorities:

1. Increasing our Galactica output to meet current demand; and

2. Moving forward with the scheduled commencement of Pegasus.”

Fantastic news if we’re now funded to push on from Galactica into Pegasus.

It’s geologically unique in trying to liberate helium directly from fluids from basement fractures in the absence of hydrocarbons. Or at least it was unique until the Chinese started producing helium from a deep geothermal energy pilot plant last summer.

I don’t think they ‘hid’ much significant other than doing what all junior companies do and putting a positive gloss on the RNS wordings. After the Itumbula discovery and EWT they presented the results factually and offered a best case scenario, which seems to have been their model for the feasibility study. They said, “ Internal modelling demonstrates that this could increase to 20,000 bpd of fluid with artificial lift in the development phase. On this basis, the Company estimates the actual flow rate would increase to 6,176 scf/d of helium, when applying an average concentration of 5.5% helium.”

What they omitted to say was their model would require a 0.99% gas water ratio. They probably should have shown their working but the published CPR assessed this, gave it a low chance of success and offered a more cautious case. So they didn’t hide it.

The ESP results were mixed, the fluid production was better than the cautious case (12,400 bbl) but short of best case (20,000 bbl). The helium concentration was on target. The GWR only just scraped the worst case scenario (P90 in the CPR) but they offered a plausible theory to explain this.

Chatbots are of no practical use for investment decisions unless your prompt engineering skill is high. Most LLMs will simply reinforce your own linguistic bias unless you specifically engineer that out. They will also tend to weight analysis to unsubstantiated online opinions over fact unless you specifically engineer that. If you prompt an analysis of HE1 then the primary source link will always be to this LSE chat board, which is mostly full of garbage, followed by the company’s RNS texts, which are heavily weighted towards subtlety positive linguistic terms. You will get out what you put in.

Also the commercial chance of success for Tai/Itumbula was well known, published and reviewed in previous CPRs (roughly in region of 10-14% at the time before drilling). If retail investors choose not to read this stuff then that’s not the company’s fault. The project has clear commercial potential, if the extraction and processing contingencies can be resolved. Proving that was never going to be quick or easy. No doubt they hoped the ESP test might have achieved that and it did bring them a bit closer but they’ll need to try again.