Fourth uranium mine a 'formality' | National Breaking News | The Australian

IT is now only a formality before final approvals are granted to allow work to start at a fourth Australian uranium mine, a Canadian developer has said.
Development of the Honeymoon mine, near South Australia's Flinders Ranges, would, among other consequences, place pressure on the Labor Party's no new mines policy.

Neal Froneman, chief executive of SXR Uranium One, which has mining interests in South Africa and Canada, as well as Australia, said the company already had an export permit and a state mining lease to develop the mine.

"The only other licence that we require is called a work licence and that's a procedural matter," Mr Froneman told ABC Radio today.

"We believe that will take about three months more and the applications are currently with the relevant government departments.

"We're pretty certain that the outcomes will be positive."

Mr Froneman said Australia would come under increasing pressure to develop its large, known uranium reserves.

"It represents enormous opportunity for Australia," he said.

"Australia has the single biggest uranium resource in the world.

"It therefore needs to be mined at a much bigger rate.

"Certainly, with the growth in high-quality uranium deposits (with) shallow, low-technical risk, Australia is a place where uranium mining has to increase."

He said the lack of greenhouse gas production from uranium use in power generation is a major factor for some countries.

"Right now, the only practical, commercial form of clean energy that is commercial on a sustainable basis, is nuclear energy," Mr Froneman said.

"That's going to put a huge burden on Australia to bring uranium into production."

Australia's three operating uranium mines are Ranger in the Northern Territory and Olympic Dam and Beverley in South Australia.

Labor's federal finance spokesman Lindsay Tanner yesterday threw his weight behind a change to Labor's long-standing policy of opposing new uranium mines.

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