Critica lands inaugural 160Mt WA rare earths resource

Critica Limited has hit a significant de-risking milestone at its mammoth Jupiter rare earths project in Western Australia, delivering a maiden indicated resource of 160 million tonnes grading 1700 parts per million (ppm) total rare earth oxides (TREO).

The update, prepared by independent consultant SRK Consulting, follows a targeted infill drilling campaign that successfully converted 10 per cent of what Critica describes as the largest clay-hosted rare earths resource into a higher-confidence category.

Infill drilling on a 125m by 125m grid across 3.3 square kilometres of the project’s 42-square-kilometre resource footprint delivered the upgrade. The tighter spacing gave Critica sufficient confidence in the geology and grade continuity to support the move from inferred to indicated status, while the balance remains inferred on broader drilling.

Jupiter’s total inventory stands at a colossal 1.7 billion tonnes grading 1700ppm TREO, comprising 160 million tonnes in the indicated category and 1.5 billion tonnes in the inferred category.

‘The delivery of Jupiter’s first Indicated Mineral Resource is an important milestone and demonstrates the effectiveness of the targeted infill drilling completed over the past year.’

Critica Limited chief executive officer Jacob Deysel

For reporting purposes, the updated estimate used a 1000ppm TREO lower cut-off, excluding any material grading below that level. Critica says the cut-off grade is more conservative than many peer projects and was selected due to Jupiter’s shallow, consistent mineralisation and preliminary metallurgical results.

Notably, valuable magnet rare earth oxides (MREO) make up a solid 25 per cent of the total rare earths within the new indicated resource, hitting a grade of 420ppm. These elements - neodymium, praseodymium, dysprosium and terbium - are essential for the high-performance permanent magnets used in electric vehicles, wind turbines and defence applications, making them a key driver of project value.

Critica Limited chief executive officer Jacob Deysel said: “The results provide increased confidence in the geological and grade continuity of the infill-drilled area, while the vast majority of the Jupiter resource remains classified as Inferred.”

With the resource upgrade now in the bag, the company says the all-important Jupiter scoping study is progressing and will be released shortly, offering the first detailed look at the giant deposit’s potential economics. Sedgman has been engaged to do the initial study, with prefeasibility work planned afterwards, including flora and fauna, cultural heritage, groundwater, water bores and resource-definition drilling.

This is the first time part of Jupiter’s enormous tonnage has entered the indicated category, a crucial step in Critica’s transition from explorer to developer. The result strengthens confidence in the drilled area and demonstrates the potential for further infill drilling to upgrade more of the inferred resource, paving the way for the company to systematically de-risk the deposit.

Jupiter forms part of Critica’s flagship and wholly owned Brothers project, a semi-contiguous 1700-square-kilometre landholding 550km north-east of Perth and 60km west of Mount Magnet in Western Australia’s Mid West.

The deposit is less than 10km from the sealed Geraldton–Mount Magnet Road and 250km from Geraldton’s port. The Mid-West gas pipeline runs alongside the road and electricity infrastructure runs 40km to the southwest.

Its shallow, flat-lying clay-hosted profile may support simpler mining than a deep hard-rock operation. The rare earths sit in fine phosphate minerals and are highlighted by low uranium and thorium levels, which could offer processing, handling and permitting advantages.

As part of the developing flowsheet, metallurgical studies have pinpointed a process of magnetic separation and flotation before acid baking, water leaching, impurity removal and rare earth precipitation. Pilot optimisation, by-product recovery and product qualification continue.

Critica says its beneficiation testwork has delivered an impressive 81 per cent recovery of magnet rare earths, upgrading the concentrate grade 14-fold to about three per cent TREO while rejecting a whopping 95 per cent of the unwanted material. The result could slash the volume of material requiring costly downstream processing, potentially delivering a significant boost to the project’s economics.

Critica is also advancing Mt Lindsay in north-west Tasmania, one of the world’s largest undeveloped tungsten-tin systems. The new scoping study has thrown up some eye-watering numbers, boasting $1.42 billion pre-tax net present value (NPV), a stellar 64.9 per cent internal rate of return and a lightning-fast 1.9-year payback, all for a comparatively modest upfront capital outlay of $244.5 million.

Together, both Jupiter and Mt Lindsay give the company exposure to a broader suite of critical minerals as Western governments seek more secure and diversified supply chains outside China.

With a maiden indicated resource now defined, Critica has taken a major step in turning Jupiter’s jaw-dropping scale into a credible development proposition. All eyes will now be on that upcoming scoping study to see just what kind of economic heft this massive critical minerals deposit might carry.

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