Mauritania’s first uranium mine comes into view despite funding, security issues
Aura Energy's bankable feasibility study outlined a $500-million valuation for its Tiris project.
Mauritania is set to become the first country in West Africa to host a uranium mine, despite facing funding and security challenges. Aura Energy (ASX: AEE; AIM: AURA) has outlined a feasibility study that values its Tiris project at $500 million, with construction costs estimated at $350 million. The study also reveals a 28% post-tax internal rate of return (IRR), which is 11 percentage points lower than a 2024 technical report, despite a 12% increase in the uranium price to $90 per pound.
The Tiris project is located approximately 1,100 km northeast of the capital, Nouakchott, in the mineral-rich but high-risk Tiris Zemmour region. According to Sean Hagarty, a security analyst and founder of the risk intelligence firm Region Alert, the Mauritanian army manages security in the region and has cleared artisanal miners from a 10-km strip along the Algerian frontier.
Aura's security plan will likely need to be developed in collaboration with the army, as the region's unsafe conditions in artisanal gold mining have alerted communities to potential dangers. Aura's Executive Chair, Philip Mitchell, believes that the Tiris project, which is expected to open in 2028, will establish a new uranium province in Mauritania, coming at a time when demand for uranium is accelerating.
The project's robust nature means that it will open a new uranium province in Mauritania, according to Aura's Executive Chair Philip Mitchell. "It comes on line just as demand for uranium is accelerating," he said in a release.
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