Mongolian metallurgical coal explorer and infrastructure company, Aspire Mining Limited recently announced that it has received Mining License MV-020941 covering 860.91 hectares of the Nuurstei Coking Coal Project from the Mineral Resources Authority of Mongolia.
This is an important milestone for the Nuurstei Coking Coal Project. A conceptual mine plan has been prepared based on the JORC Compliant Resource (4.75 Mt Indicated and 8.1 Mt of Inferred - refer ASX Announcement 13 April 2016) which indicates a potentially attractive mining proposition to truck coal 420 kilometres to the nearest rail head at Erdenet for export to North Eastern coking coal customers (refer ASX Announcement 19 April 2017). Nuurstei coking coal has been successfully tested in Chinese coke plants as a high quality low sulphur hard coking coal. The Company is currently preparing for a bulk trial of indicative Nuurstei raw coal to test logistics paths and costs targeting delivery into the Tangshan coking coal market. This coal is planned to be washed at a toll facility in northern China before delivery into Tangshan. The trial will also provide valuable data for future wash plant design; be important in completing a feasibility study for the Nuurstei Project; and provide commercial scale samples for targeted end customers.
Aspire Managing Director David Paull said that “securing a Mining License is an important milestone and reflects the Mongolian Government’s continued support for the Company and the coal industry in general. This vindicates our original decision in June 2014 to look to add a new coking coal project which is not rail dependent and the decision in July 2017 to exercise our option to move to a 90% interest. The Company is now working very hard on commercialising this high quality coking coal project as soon as possible.”