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DIGGeRs & DeALeRs

Perth, Western Australia 21
November 9 - 10

Beyondie bounces back

Kalium Lakes is now targeting first SoP
he year was only a few hours old when so hopefully that’s the start of 2020 done production from Beyondie in Q3 2021
TKalium Lakes Ltd managing director and the rest of the next six months is all Perth, Western Australia 21
November 9 - 10
Brett Hazelden received the call to pack his upside,” he said.
bag and make an urgent trip to his compa- “We wouldn’t expect any more surprises “We’ve had a lot of good comments from
ny’s Beyondie potash project, about 160km for the rest of this year at least. We have some of our peers, saying ‘we want to see
south-east of Newman. a fixed-price EPC being put in place for these up and running’ because it proves
Little did he know it would be the start the process plant, we already have a fixed the process and that allows them to be
of a torrid few months for a company that price around all the German content and able to get up and running as well,” he
was shaping to be Australia’s first SoP pro- engineering and the gas pipeline and pow- said. “The last thing you want is the indus-
ducer. er station are fixed-price projects as well. try falling over before it even starts.
Two cyclones passed through the sec- “This was a hurdle that hit us all at once. “There’s only four of these around the
tion of the Pilbara which hosts Beyondie We managed to get a perfect storm there world that are being built. It’s interesting
and while neither event directly hit site, with COVID-19 with markets going down, when you go back and look at your bench- The world’s pre-eminent gold exploration event
access roads were washed out and con- oil price heading down, so we couldn’t have marking and everything else…it’s not like
struction works delayed while repairs were picked it at a worse time if we tried. But, the gold market where you know how 25 years of world-class discoveries from
undertaken. from our point of view, at least we knew it much a gold plant is to build, how much it is
But the setbacks didn’t end there. In Feb- and we identified it pretty early in the con- to operate, etc. We’re creating the bench- 43 countries around the globe
ruary, the Kalium Lakes team discovered a struction process. So, rather than being marks and we’re on that leading edge
forecast capital cost overrun of $53 million, 80% complete and then suddenly coming there, learning the process as we go.”
primarily driven by changes to the process out and confessing our sins, we wanted to Construction of the key items such as
plant design to accommodate performance do it the right way.” the purification plant and the 80km gas
guarantees requested by the company’s Kalium Lakes indicated the overall pro- pipeline were due to begin at the time of
secured lender. ject build was 40% complete and about print, while the residual workshops and
Further design changes to incorporate $100 million of costs had been incurred to admin facilities are on track to be finished
additional final product storage and treat- the end of May. The 2018 BFS estimated later this month.
ment were also required to meet product a pre-production capex of $216 million, in- The company’s brine inventory is also
integrity specifications. The company cluding contingency. accumulating nicely with 1.5GL grading
also acknowledged it had underestimated First production has now been pushed 19.8kg/cubic metre – equivalent to about
the complexity of transferring a German- out to Q3 2021, having previously been set 27,000t of SoP – entering the evaporation
based design to a desert location in West- for the final months of this year. circuit in solution.
ern Australia. “The main thing now is to deliver and not “By the end of the year we really want
Kalium Lakes knew it had to raise a sub- have another cost overrun,” Hazelden said. to have almost all of our ponds completed
stantial sum to address the cost overrun, “We’ve allowed for an extra six months and in place, the gas pipeline installed with
but timing was not on the company’s side effectively to get the project built, even the exception of the final connections into
as key financial markets started shutting though we only really had three months’ the purification plant and really just getting www.newgengold.com
down in March due to the global COVID-19 worth of delays associated with the review as much salt built up in the ponds as we
pandemic. process. can,” Hazelden said.
The potash hopeful was forced into a “We’ve got the ability to potentially bring “We’re looking forward to having almost For all enquiries about presenting, exhibiting or attending please contact
lengthy trading suspension while it went it in earlier, which is what we’re hoping on close to a year’s worth of salts in terms of
back to the drawing board, eventually doing, but at the moment it’s best to be pre-production works in the ponds or on a Mitchelle Matambo on (+61) 8 9321 0355 or email mitchelle@paydirt.com.au
emerging with a $61 million equity raising conservative and hit a date that’s realistic ROM pad for the purification plant so that
and a revised development timeline for Be- versus continuing to promote a story that when we start it mid-next year we can do
yondie. was probably going to disappoint a lot of so without any limitations.”
Hazelden told Paydirt he was confident people.” Jointly organised by:
all the major issues had been identified and Hazelden said the company had been – Michael Washbourne
contingency plans were in place for any buoyed by encouraging words from some
further unexpected setbacks. of the company’s peers in the potash
“It’s been a challenging start to the year, space. Keith Yates & Associates Pty Ltd

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