Roundtable Discussion; The Future of Mineral Sands. Watch the video here.
Noble has had some discussions about leasing a helium plant and signing offtake agreement. That would be cheap way to get to production/revenue. And Noble is having those discussions with companies that can provide that in Tanzania, in fact in the exact neighborhood. These were comments about NHE presentation a t conference yesterday. Helium one should be having the same type of conversations.
NHE also mentioned that “commercial negotiations towards securing a leased plant and offtake agreement are continuing”.
Flyseal: This is the reason both Noble and HE1 are here drilling. (comment about Oxford Noble gas group getting Helium One interested).
Oxford has been very helpful for sure, but the reason Oxford got involved is that Helium One founders Thomas Abraham-James and Josh Bluett got interested in some helium gas measurement done long ago and were also intrigued by the helium seeps. So THEY (Helium One leaders) brought the helium in Tanzania story to Oxford scientists and got them interested in doing soem measurements and some modelling. It was not the other way around. I never understood exactly why Thomas Abraham-Jones left Helium One. He of course is now CEO of Pulsar Helium, still looking for primary helium but now in Minnesota and Greenland of all places. Pulsar is currently drilling a pivotal appraisal well in MInnesota (that is right in middle of US on northern border next to Canada for my London friends) and will have results in less than a month. Minnesota is part of the North American rift valley extending from northern MN to Hudson Bay. The path to drilling (and hopefully testing) a well has been more direct for Pulsar in MN than it was for Helium One in Tanzania. Here is a bit of the story for anyone who is interested.
https://energy-oil-gas.com/news/helium-one/
Long term investors were wiped out. The only ones rewarded were those newbies that bought for a quarter of a pence and those that took the big risk of becoming hybrid long and short holders and lowered their basis with shares at the time of the big massacre.
Nothing wrong with raising cash at ever increasing share price. But the recent placement of 2 Billion shares at a quarter of a pence was terribly harmful to LTH. Just about killed them in fact.
Well they should do flow tests and pressure build up tests at Itumbula 1 and try to prove up helium reserves and also commerciality. They should do some additional work on hydrogen as well. They probably do not have enough money for an Itumbula 2 appraisal well.
They could also haul their Predator rig over to Tai 3 and drill through to the fractured basement and do more complete testing of that well. They would have done that at the time but for the broken rig, and not having enough money to complete Tai 1 and drill Itumbula 1.
BUT most importantly, they should be working to figure out how they will finance the next stage that will get them to production and sales. They will need a JV or an offtake agreement or some government funds. Noble has that step all planned, Helium One should be working very hard on this.
Walkley: Hydrogen not very important - there are two atoms of it in every water molecule! More interesting is the 80 degree temperature found in the hole a possible geothermal energy resource.
It takes a lot of energy to convert methane or water to hydrogen. You can use natural gas but that releases CO2. Or you can use wind energy or solar or hydro to power hydrolysis. I think they call that green hydrogen. But a direct source of hydrogen from nature (white hydrogen) is valuable because it requires no additional energy to produce.
....short term, medium turn, long term. We desperately need to break out of this long brutal downtrend that began in May of 2021, then stabilize at a bottom. and have a nice reversal into a sustained uptrend. Not seeing that as highly likely. The downtrend is still powerfully intact. It will be three years old (long) in three more months. So discouraging and depressing.
Onsolidground: Triumph1 they will go back and redrill Tai fully and this time drilling fully into the basement and they will imvho get their next big payday of Helium.
Lets get to the exciting news on Itumbula first with those the flowrates, resource estimates, timescales and roadmap to commercialisation as you point out, then we can hopefully all just sit back and let things multiply.
Completion and flow rates and pressure tests and reserve estimations at this well will cost a lot. Going back to Tai 3 with the predator rig and drilling through the fractured basement and then doing all the testing as for Itumbula will cost a lot. They have no money. They need a JV partner, an off take agreement, or a cooperative agreement with the government of Tanzania or with another sponsor such as the US government. Now we will see what they can do. There last play to stay alive when they ran out of money essentially wiped out all their long term shareholders who were unwilling to double down with a high risk and likely imprudent second bet.
Am60. You are only really happy if you averaged down at 0.25 pence. Otherwise there was so much value destruction from 2 billion shares at 0.25 pence that you cannot be down only 50%. A 97.5% drop has to be followed by a 4000% increase to get back to even. We still have a ways to go for the LTH who simply kept their intial stake. I did add 500,000 more at near the offer price but that was a very risky thing and really was not fair to LTH to make them choose to do that or simply forfeit most of what they had invested. Now the next question is how they will structure the next step in their development - to the benefit of shareholders, or just another round of value destruction. They have options but it will take some skill to pull it off.
Pulsar has a discovery well from 2011. They are doing an appraisal well. The geology is also simpler. As is the path to production if a commercial discovery is proven. It will all play out in a month.
Noble has a clearer path to production (at least according to them) if they do find a commercial discovery. Kent Masters (CEO of Albemarle) is a key early investor and can help with that process. They will get someone else to build a plant and handle the output. They will take a lesser price but will have revenue. They have some tentative plans and agreements, just have to prove commerciality.
Meanwhile Helium One has an exciting well. Really amazing with free flow of 4.6% helium gas plus free flow of hydrogen, plus some argon and some hot water to generate electricity. But they just trashed all long term holders with a 2 billion share sale at 0.25 pence. So god knows whether they have to expertise to get the right partnership or off take agreements or government support to move ahead without further destruction of the shareholders. What they did was awful. The well is wonderful. There is a bit of uncertainty about how they handle this moment.
Scott what did you think she was going to use to pay for taking it commercial - buttons?
Noble has a deal all in place (if they prove commerciality) for an industrial gas company to provide a plant and handle everything from there. They will get a lesser price but they will be able to monetize a commercial discovery if they get one. One of their key early investors is Kent Masters, CEO of Albemarle who knows who knows how deals like this are made at certain stage of development of a resource. So does Justyn Wood for that matter. Helium one has got to use their board and executive team to quickly forge a path and communicate it. There are a number of options.
The bigggest mistake CEO has done is she admit, finance needed further after this drilling and everyone aware of that, how big it needed for this to get next commercial level.
Yes and they shafted the private investors to raise very little money. Hope that does not play out the same way this time around. I would rather get a partner or a off take agreement or some financing from Tanzania for a percent of all production going forward, or even a deal with US that is throwing money at potential new helium supply like the Virginia plant of Regeneren in South Africa. Or sell the whole company to a Total/AiLiquide joint venture for 300 million pounds.
276k total trading volume for total of US$ 8280. That in contrast to London where over 1 BILLION shares have traded.
Shares are up about 100% at US$ .0375 (about 3 pence) but you cannot buy any there that I can see. Share price just simmering, following London for most part, and waiting for some clarity on funding of next steps I guess.
Linde has been mentioned and is investing heavily in helium and in green hydrogen.
Total Energies has operations in Tanzania and is partnering with Air Liquide on green hydrogen projects. Air Liquide is a leader in helium gas industry. Total and AirLiquide are investing in LNG plant in Tanzania costing many billions.
US government has increased its loan commitment to Regeneron for the Virginia helium plant in south africa.
Target was Holbrook basin in Arizona which produced primary Helium from Pinto Dome for many years and was touted as the "Saudi Arabia of helium." They drilled some wells and built an expensive processing plant powered by a big solar complex. Then the wells would not flow, they couldn't get permits to do recompletions. The dismantled the plant, bought a marginal natural gas field in New Mexico, moved the plant there, have some natural gas wells with elevated helium levels (still under .5% I think), are trying to extract the helium with their plant and sell the natural gas. The big shift all happened suddenly, it is kind of a weird project, who knows if it will work. Management a bit odd too. They are not on the edge of BK at the moment, but nothing there that appeals to me anyway.
Trolley Dolly: You would be amazed at how many people do not understand that. They are very happy to see a share jump up 50% - after a 50% fall. Many of them could do the calculation if they put pen to paper or entered the numbers into their calculator or spreadsheet. But still they seem to be happy to see that example play out.