Nuinsco’s Prairie Lake Project well-positioned in race for secure critical minerals supply

from Ontario Mining Review E-newsletter, Issue 3,2022

Steps to improved cutting performance

The race for security of critical minerals supply is on. To secure supply chains for the future, governments around the globe are looking to decrease their reliance on current sources of critical minerals, ideally via projects within their own borders.

The rapid increase in the acceptance of solar and wind power and electric vehicles has accelerated demand for all types of critical minerals, such as rare earth elements (“Rees”) and niobium. In addition, recent geopolitical events highlight the vital importance for countries to take charge of their energy and critical metals supply chains as a matter of national security. This demands diversification from current sources – principally China. According to EY Canada1, China controls almost 90 per cent of global Ree refining and more than 50 per cent of Ree mining. in 2019, the united states and the european union imported 80 per cent and 98 per cent, respectively, of their REEs from China.

Nuinsco Resources Limited (“Nuinsco”), with its 100 per centowned Prairie Lake critical minerals and phosphate project, is extremely well-positioned to be a key link in the advancement of Canada’s critical minerals supply chain in the near-term and for years to come.

Ideally located near Terrace Bay, Ontario, Prairie Lake has been evaluated by Nuinsco over a number of years, but given the current rise in demand for critical minerals the timing of the release of the Prairie Lake maiden mineral resource estimate (“MRe”) could not be better.

Announced in May of this year, the Prairie Lake MRE, in accordance with National instrument 43-101, breaks down as follows:

• 871.8 million tonne inferred Mineral

Resource including 2.01 kg/t total rare earth oxides (“TReO”)*, plus niobium and phosphate.

• 15.6 million tonne indicated Mineral

Resource including 1.67 kg/t TREO, plus niobium and phosphate.

*TReO incorporates neodymium, praseodymium, scandium, cerium, lanthanum, samarium, yttrium, and tantalum.

In addition to the extremely large mineral resource, Prairie Lake is superbly located relative to all required infrastructure – rail lines, power grid, and deep-water ports for shipping via the Great Lakes are all nearby. The site is easily accessed by an all-weather road from the TransCanada Highway which is located a mere 28 kilometres to the south. Importantly, the communities of Marathon and Terrace Bay are close by, potentially benefitting access to, and quality of life for, personnel.

So what’s next for Prairie Lake?

“The completion of the MRE is a major milestone in the advancement of the project,” said Paul Jones, Nuinsco’s CEO. “But we are already looking

toward next steps - preliminary economic studies and a metallurgical program to supplement the metallurgy we have already done and to better define the characteristics of the mineralization and enhanced potential for recovery and concentration of elements of economic interest.”2

All of this aligns nicely with the government of Canada’s Canadian Minerals and Metals Plan which identifies many of the elements found at Prairie Lake as “critical minerals.” The government is also in the process of crafting its Critical Minerals Strategy, the vision of which is to “boost the supply of critical minerals to grow domestic and global value chains for the green and digital economy.”

Given the incentive for governments to establish strategic autonomy in critical minerals, increasing demand for the elements identified in the MRE, ready access to essential infrastructure and a location in one of the world’s premier mining jurisdictions, Prairie Lake should have an inside line in Canada’s race to secure a reliable source of critical minerals supply for today and well into the future.

For more information on Nuinsco Resources Limited or its Prairie Lake project, please visit www.nuinsco.ca.

1 Critical minerals supply and demand challenges mining companies face, by Harrison Bontje and Don Duval, https://www.ey.com/en_ca/miningmetals/critical-minerals-supply-anddemand-challenges

2 Canada’s critical minerals strategy: Discussion paper, https://www. canada.ca/en/campaign/criticalminerals-in-canada/canada-criticalminerals-strategy-discussion-paper. html#a66.