Alligator Energy (ASX:AGE) has just kicked off a Definitive Feasibility Study (DFS) at its Samphire Uranium Project in South Australia.
From here, the economic factors derived from the field recovery trial (FRT) will go into completing the economic model by Q1 2027 for a full-scale in-situ recovery (ISR) operation.
CEO Andrea Marsland-Smith tells Mining.com.au the company made “monumental steps” in 2025 to get to this point and derisk the project through securing the retention lease and progressing construction of FRT plant on time and on budget.
These initial FRT results are important to further derisk Samphire from an economic perspective, as well as from a technical perspective through confirmation of the ISR viability in real field conditions, she says.
ISR enables the recovery of uranium by essentially reversing the natural process that deposited the uranium in the first place. The highly saline groundwater within the sedimentary sand layer that hosts the orebody is conditioned to mobilise the uranium back into solution, which is then drawn to the recovery wells.
As such, ISR mining is an effective and economic uranium extraction method and accounts for 60% of the world’s current uranium production and has been operated in South Australia since 1998.
Samphire is located 20km from Whyalla, which is an industrial hub (iron/steel), with regional infrastructure, skilled labour, and local engineering/services – “important because ISR project equivalents are remote, infrastructure-light, or reliant on long supply chains”, the CEO tells this news service.
The project has a resource of 18Mlbs at Blackbush (May 2025 MRE) to support a start-up operation with staged expansion, and a scoping study framing 1.2Mlbs per annum and potential DFS upside.
The orebody is shallow (<100m), which leads to cheaper sustaining capex once in full operation. The asset has around 78% of its resource in the indicated JORC category.
“This is driven by the density of the drill spacing, which provides a more granular understanding of the ore body and thereby a high level of resource integrity and accuracy which is required for detailed wellfield design to be input into the BFS,” Marsland-Smith tells this news service.
In mid-December, Alligator Energy achieved practical completion of the pilot plant for the Samphire project on schedule. The CEO says this is strong validation of the construction and commissioning plan, particularly given the logistical and operational complexity of building a new pilot plant.
Cost performance was equally strong, she says, adding that with the construction completed under budget, which Alligator notes demonstrates effective procurement, tight contractor oversight, and consistent control of project scope.
Alligator will begin field recovery trials work at Samphire in February 2026. Control of the site has been transferred back to the company for pre-operation activities, which include stage three dry and stage four wet commissioning, beginning in January 2026.
CEO Andrea Marsland-Smith will be presenting at the RIU Explorers Conference in Fremantle, Western Australia being held from 17-19 February. Mining.com.au is an official media partner of this year’s event and will have a team reporting from the floor.
Write to Adam Orlando at Mining.com.au
Images: Alligator Energy
