FPX aiming to clear environmental hurdles for major nickel mine project near Fort Saint James

The Baptiste Nickel project, northwest of Fort Saint James still has to go through a few more hoops before construction can begin.

According to FPX Nickel, a pre-feasibility study was completed in September of 2023, with the early stages of a feasibility study underway.

President and CEO, Martin Turenne told Vista Radio they hope to get all the environmental hurdles out of the way either this year or next.

“We would hope later in 2024 or 2025 to enter into the Environmental Impact Assessment process, which is the key regulatory step of course based on the precedent timing of those environmental assessments this could put the project in a construction decision later this decade, potentially in 2028 or thereabouts.”

“For those who are familiar with the Mount Milligan mine, this is a project of a similar scale and one that can be similarly beneficial, of course, developing it now means that we are laser-focused in ensuring the local community and that the First Nations benefit to the greatest extent from the development of the project.”

The estimated initial capital cost for the development of the project is over 2 billion dollars.

During construction, the Baptiste project will create over 2-thousand jobs – once in operation, between 500 and 600 full-time jobs will be supported. The expected mining life is 29 years.

When in operation, Turrene expects it to be one of the biggest nickel mines in operation on a global scale.

“So, the first phase of production over the first eight to nine years of the projected mine life – the current concept for that is to process and produce approximately 45,000 tonnes of nickel per year. Then in years in eight and nine, there would be an addition to the milling and concentrating facilities that would expand nickel production to about 70,000 tonnes of nickel production over the remaining 20 years or so of the mine life.”

Last week, FPX Nickel announced a 14.4 million dollar strategic equity investment from Japanese-based Sumitomo Metal Mining, the country’s largest mining and metals processing company.

“They are partnered with many other Canadian mining operators, most notably with Tech Resources, which is, of course, well-known in the province. Sumitomo, there are part of an ecosystem in Japan of securing raw materials for the Japanese economy, they are very focused on securing and producing nickel that is suitable for electric vehicle batteries – that is a growing part of the demand for nickel. They have identified our product as being one of interest,” said Turrene.

Under the terms of the private placement, FPX will issue 30,104,488 common shares in the capital of the company to Sumitomo for $0.48 per share.

“So, they will own about 9.9% of FPX and they will be great partners for us to continue to develop the project in terms of their financial capacity and technical expertise. It’s great to be working with them,” said Turrene.